Mohamed Aymen Chihaoui

Biography

Aymen is the Heritage Custodian of Monastir City. Within this role, Ayman looks after five museums, four archaeological sites, more than ten historical monuments and four storages. Ayman still works with the Museum of Art and Traditions as an Assistant of the Scientific Programme. Aymen creates heritage events not only for the museum, but for the whole city. 

Previously, Aymen was the Director of the Costume Museum in Monastir, where he worked with a team from The National Heritage Institute on the redevelopment of the museum. Within this, Aymen worked on new labels and panels for the objects and gallery spaces, and drew inspiration from his International Training Programme Object in focus project.  With the team, Aymen worked on the restoration of the building and creating new exhibitions.

When he came on the ITP in 2023, Aymen was the Director of the Archeological Enfidha Museum, as well as the Leader Habib Bourguiba Museum where he was responsible for the development of the collection for the public and for research.  Aymen created events for the museum, including family tours and VIP visits and his other responsibilities included condition checking the museum collection, documentation and digitising collection records.

Aymen believes that education programmes in museums are very important in the preservation of cultural heritage as children should be taught its importance.  While at the Archeological Enfidha Museum and Leader Habib Bourguiba Museum, he focused on creating an education programme for the museum which ran cultural events and workshops for children. This included a ‘museum suitcase’ project, which aimed to bring the collection outside of the museum to children and schools.

At the British Museum
During Aymen’s time on the International Training Programme, he was based in the Department of Greece and Rome and his UK partner placement was spent at Norfolk Museums Service.

As an ongoing project throughout the six-week programme, fellows were asked to use their existing skills and experience, and the knowledge gained throughout the annual programme, to create, develop, and propose a new interpretation for an object currently on display in the British Museum. Aymen, along with his departmental group, used their object, a marble statue of Apollo with a kithara and quiver, to tell the story of Apollo in Greek mythology.

Aymen’s participation on the International Training Programme was generously supported by the Al Tajir Trust.