Disruptive Interpretation

The right to create meaning on behalf of the museum is highly contested and the label is the battlefield to decide whose meaning prevails, thereby disrupting museum hierarchies. As museums create new knowledge, while curators are still fundamental to the exhibition’s mission, new technologies and new social practices put pressure on the curators’ monopoly on meaning-making. Moreover, although stories may change, the underlying ‘power structure’ - from expert to lay person - often remains unchanged and unchallenged. The answer is not merely to pass from one expert to another, nor to declare all voices equal - it is to see the museum as a site for research and debate, not a place where meanings are stable, in short, as a verb not a noun. From 2006 - 2015, while James M. Bradburne was Director General, the Palazzo Strozzi’s exhibitions served as a laboratory for how museums could explore ways to support…