Science Speed Dating

Science Speed Dating

“180 Seconds to Counter Stereotypes in Museums. On Alternative Displays of Arts from Southwest Asia, North Africa, and beyond”

Date: July 10, 2025, 4.30 pm

Place: M26 – Der Kulturenraum, Maximilianstraße 26, 93047 Regensburg

How can exhibitions of arts from diverse regions counter stereotypes? Instead of lamenting clichéd displays of arts - especially regarding those from Southwest Asia and North Africa -, there are already great ideas around from which to learn: A group of international museum professionals and researchers convenes in Regensburg (Germany) to exchange examples, experiences and strategies. An open session will present ideas in 180 seconds each to foster a dialogue with anyone interested. You are cordially invited to join, to bring in your perspectives and to pose your questions.

Participants:

Monia Abdallah (Université de Québec à Montréal)
Vera Beyer (Universität Regensburg)
Christine Gerbich (Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden)
Klas Grinell (Världskulturmuseet, Göteborg)
Susan Kamel (Hochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft, Berlin)
Banu Karaca (Forum Transregionale Studien, Berlin)
Anahita Mittertrainer (Museum Fünf Kontinente, München)
Schoole Mostafawy (Badisches Landesmuseum, Karlsruhe)
Kerstin Pinther (Humboldtforum/Ethnologisches Museum, Berlin)
Mirjam Shatanawi (Reinwardt Academie, Amsterdam)
Laura Vigo (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Montréal)
Philipp Zobel (Universität Regensburg/Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin).
         
With a video installation by Elias Nunner
          

Workshop “Countering Orientalisms in Displays of Arts of Southwest Asia and North Africa”

Approaches to decolonise museums have been around for long, but have finally gained at least certain influence in the last years. First restitutions of colonially looted works are immensely critical steps. Yet, the colonial implications of the displays stay less tackled. Exhibits of the arts from Southwest Asia and North Africa, for example, often remain spellbound by Orientalist displays, displaying the works as essentially different to artistic developments in Europe. Here too, critique is not new any more and important prototypes have been realised, the difficulties to change Orientalising displays commonly persist. At the same time, this aspect of decolonising museums is a dire deficiency: as mechanisms which have been described under the term of “Orientalism” are still incomprehensibly enduring not only in the displays of our collections but correspondingly in the ongoing culturalist Othering of persons interpreted as “Muslim” in our societies.

The workshop “Countering Orientalisms in Displays of Arts of Southwest Asia and North Africa. Exchanging Examples, Experiences and Strategies” brings together different scholars from museums and universities to exchange practical experiences with concrete interventions, recommendable practice examples and institutional strategies how to intervene in the current displays of collections. In one session ideas will be presented to the public in 180 seconds each to foster a dialogue with anyone interested.

The workshop is organised in cooperation with Zentrum Erinnerungskultur (Centre for Commemorative Culture) and generously supported by the Universitätsstiftung Hans Vielberth.