ICOM Germany | ICOM Europe Conference on "Museums, Borders and European Responsibilities - 100 years after WWI"

1. Where do we go from here?
This is the real dope
Maria Vlachou
Museums, Borders and European Responsibilities
100 Years After WWI
Ludwig Museum, Koblenz, 25.11.18

3. “Its single purpose is to bring
to you in the simplest,
quickest, and most accurate
form the things which every
man who has served in The
Great War must know to put
him in touch again with God's
Country.”

5. We are irrelevant and
outdated bystanders!

6. We are irrelevant and
outdated bystanders!
“A grand canyon has opened
up in our world. On one side
is the new right, promoting a
bizarre mixture of Christianity
and libertarianism; on the
other, the ‘illiberal liberals’,
obsessed with identity politics
and complaining about things
like cultural appropriation.
These tiny factions war
above, while the rest of us
watch, aghast, from the
chasm below.”
Stephen Fry

8. “History can also show up,
unannounced, in the life of
nations and be slow to leave.
Such was the fate of Europe's
nations during the Great War
starting in 1914. A war which
took the sunny, optimistic and
peaceful continent of the time
by surprise. In 1913,
Europeans expected to live a
lasting peace. And yet, just a
year later, a brutal war broke
out amongst brothers,
engulfing the continent.”
Jean-Claude Juncker

10. • Museums
• Borders
• European responsibilities

11. What about this heritage?
The LGBTQI+ presence in the European Year of Cultural Heritage

13. A magazine put out by the League for Human
Rights in 1930.
Writer Joseph Randall Ackerley began writing
pro-gay play The Prisoners of War while
interned at a prisoner of war camp in
Switzerland in 1917.

14. “Go to a good psychiatrist of the old school. Maybe
he can help you with your instability.”

15. “I would be unable to love my child if he/she
was homosexual.”

16. The Identitary Shield warns about the danger of
gender ideology in schools in Portugal.

17. A Portuguese Police Union defends itself against criticism for publishing
photos of captured criminals. They published photos of victims from another
country and told the President of the Republic, the Minister of Justice and all
of us that not everyone deserves the same respect.

18. A judge allows a 15-year-old Roma girl to abandon
school in the name of tradition.

19. A Law Professor claims that homosexuals should not work with boys
and that it is OK not to hire a recently-married woman as a model,
because she might become pregnant.

21. Moria refugee camp, Greece

22. “Reason is once again on trial
and many don’t trust any
longer its power to free us or
to lead us to the path of truth.”
Achille Mbembe

23. “Many turn their back on
reason in favor of other
faculties: affection, feelings,
emotions. Passion is tramping
on reason. Acting with one’s
gutts is becoming the norm.”
Achille Mbembe

24. Museum responsibilites
• Rethink what we do, how and why
• Be aware of the world around us, burst the
bubble
• Help people make connections
• Be empathetic, use clear language
• Be places of encounter
• Become more diverse
• Take responsibility for our actions

26. Museum responsibilites
• Rethink what we do, how and why
• Be aware of the world around us, burst the
bubble
• Help people make connections
• Be empathetic, use clear language
• Be places of encounter
• Become more diverse
• Take responsibility for our actions

28. ICOFOM Annual Symposium, Tehran, Oct 2018

29. Museum responsibilites
• Rethink what we do, how and why
• Be aware of the world around us, burst the
bubble
• Help people make connections
• Be empathetic, use clear language
• Be places of encounter
• Become more diverse
• Take responsibility for our actions
• Less arrogance, less certainties, more doubts

30. “Europe has a choice: to
contribute to a new
imagination of how we share
the earth or to face the
political and moral
consequences.”
Achille Mbembe

31. Thank you
Maria Vlachou
mariavlachou.pt@gmail.com
Blog: Musing on Culture