For how long should a museum’s permanent exhibition be staged and what kind of perspectives have to be addressed?

MúzeumCafé 50.

According to EmíliaMartyin, ethnographic museologist and department head at the MunkácsyMihály Museum, a permanent exhibition should communicate with the visitor, disseminate knowledge by means of original objects, be scientific, give the visitor freedom, be periodically renewed, create connections between past and present, serve education and the needs of the public, maintain its position in the cultural market, and never last more than 5-8 years. KrisztinaSzipőcs, art historian, head of the Collection and Exhibition Department of the Ludwig Museum – Museum of Contemporary Arts believes it is important every so often to focus on new art objects, as well as new acquisitions, which often place the existing objects in a new connection. ZsuzsannaToronyi, historian, museologist and director of the Hungarian Jewish Museum and Archive, notes that their ‘permanent’ exhibition is one of the oldest. The exhibition is dominated by glittering silver objects, indicating that Judaism is only a religion. As a Jewish museum concept this is problematic as it doesn’t conform to the self-image of Judaism, in which the people and the faith are always, inseparably intertwined. The exhibition is permanent, albeit not unchanging. Every element displayed has changed since the opening, although the message is not modified. According to LászlóCsorba, historian and director general of the Hungarian National Museum, the question is valid for the intellectual content of an exhibition and the visual realisation alike. The answer is relatively simple. In modern museology, as well as historical scholarship, it is evident that, since we are always looking at the past from the present, the requirements of today’s changing world lead to changes in questions concerning the past.