Staging Migration (in) Museums: A Reflection on Exhibition Design Practices for the Representation of Migration in European Contemporary Museums

Abstract

Migration, cultural diversity and the growing ethnic-cultural mix that characterize contemporary society are nowadays a key issue for European museums. Since the 1990s a rich theoretical debate on the subject has been developed by scholars and the museums community at large, several ‘migration museums’ have been opened across Europe, while, most recently, a number of museums have been reassessing their collections and galleries in relation to issues such as emigration, immigration, cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue. This article aims at contributing to the debate with a museographical reflection on the subject by exploring its design implications, to finally suggest that the challenge for representing migration in museums does not only concern the museum’s curatorial approaches but also requires the development of new exhibition settings and practices.

Keywords: exhibition design; migration museums; museography