Historical Art Museums and Art Education Finding Audience Experiences

Abstract

Museums need their audiences. The tradition to show exhibitions made by museum curators has changed for more active way to let audiences speak. Hands on-strategy to minds-on thinking has a multiple context; people want to share, tell a story via new technology. Museums are more global and they have opened the doors to volunteers and taken people to everyday life. Art education used in museum pedagogy is not only for school children. Kindergartens want to have curriculums at museums. Senior citizens want to continue year after year visiting museum’s senior club. Non-visitors may change their mind after visiting web pages. How can we fill expectations, understand the motivation and needs of our audiences, update our skills to use technology and still collaborate in a human way to collect, preserve and share knowledge. Are we even talking about audiences or more of “users” or “choosers”? International museum collaboration and art education has an important role to mediate between old traditions and new demands. We can speak of different audiences and not all want to learn or get involved to interactive processes. How can we change the visit to an experience through art education?