Creating museums of world stories

Mumbai Workshop

Marking 10 years of the International Training Programme

19-21 November 2015

Emma and I are now in Mumbai!! We are working with colleagues at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS) to put the final arrangements in place for our workshop Creating museums of world stories. Ajay Kochle, Assistant Director: Administration and Nilanjana Som, Assistant Curator, have been working hard to ensure everything will run smoothly and we’d like to thank them, and all their colleagues at CSMVS, for making us feel so welcome.

It’s been wonderful to reconnect with Manisha, Vandana and Bilwa – CSMVS has felt like a “home away from home” for us this week.

As you know, to mark ten years of the ITP CSMVS, in collaboration with the British Museum and with generous support provided by a grant from the Getty Foundation, will be hosting a workshop in Mumbai, entitled Creating museums of world storiesThe aim of the workshop will be to provide an opportunity for global museum and heritage professionals to brainstorm and debate around proposals to develop new forms of ‘encyclopaedic’ displays or museums that might be created beyond Europe and North America. These museums, displays or perhaps temporary exhibitions in the first instance, would present familiar local and national histories in the context of global stories. An exhibition at CSMVS, to open in 2016 and entitled India & the world, will present six key moments from Indian history, illustrated by objects from the collections of CSMVS. These will then be complemented by objects loaned from the British Museum, to evoke contemporary events elsewhere in the world.

The workshop will look in detail at the concept for India and the World and consider if this model could be deployed in other cities and countries. The participation of our ITP alumni will help ensure the debate around the future of museums comprises voices from across the globe.

We hope the workshop will also give opportunities for past ITP participants to reconnect with alumni and introduce participants to colleagues from across the ten annual Programmes (2006-2015), while providing a forum for networking with museum and heritage professionals from around India and the rest of the world.

We are very excited to be welcoming our ITP group to Mumbai but will miss those of you who haven’t been able to join us. If you would still like to participate have a look at the workshop Programme, narrative and work sheets (here and here) and send us your contributions which we will share on the blog.

You may also like to follow us on Twitter @britmusitp and #itpmumbai where we’ll be tweeting live from the workshop.