Tell me a story!

Tell me a story!
Storytelling for museum branding.
(illustration: Romina Mancuso)
MUSEUM MARKETING HOT TOPICS
Academic and research conference
the State Museum of the History of Religion.
St Petersburg 24-26 October 2013
Romina Mancuso
Background:
Sociologist, Ph.D. in P. R.
Museum consultant, Independent
scholar , children book author
Recent projects :
- member
of
the
Scientific
Committee for the reinstallation of
the Archaeological museum, A.
Salinas, in Palermo.
- audience development consultant
at
the
Archaeological
and
Landscape Park of the Valley of the
Temple in Agrigento.
Museum’s objects are all alike,
peacefully lying in their showcase
shelves but…
every object
has its own
story and this
make it
interesting
I will now invite you to have a look at some
random ideas coming out from the mix of four
elements:
innovative interpretive practices icon objects - children book narrative exhibitions .
• the objects of museum
collections (uniqueness,
social, iconic)
• the stories (provoke
empathy, )
• exhibiting the story by
• cases
The narrative power of an
object may be used as tool
that helps museum enhance
its image and reputation.
DON OSITO MARQUIGNA
From the collection of MJC/F :
Found among the different plush
toys is Don Osito Marquina
(Marquina Teddy Bear Esquire), a
teddy bear belonging to Anna Maria
and Salvador Dalí. Don Osito
Marquina is accompanied by the
letters written to him by the poet,
Federico García Lorca.
<<The happy circumstance of
having successfully travelled
through time intact and surviving
the childhood of his owners, allows
us to today admire this unique
teddy bear in the Toy Museum of
Catalonia in Figueres.>>
Antonina Rodrigo (1987)
Don Osito Marquina is cute, super cute.”
Federico García Lorca (1928)
Don Osito Marquina / The first twenty years of Salvador Dalí
Toy Museum of Catalonia in Figueres.
1927 Handwritten letter by Federico García Lorca to
Anna Maria Dalí in which the poet talks about Don
Osito Marquina
Bequeathed by Anna Maria Dalí to the Toy Museum of Catalonia
Documentation Centre
1926 Anna Maria and Salvador Dalì with Don Osito
Marquina. Photo by Joan Xirau in the Dalì’s studio in Figueres (MJC/F)
1918 Dalí Home in Es Lané in Cadaqués, ink drawing by Dalí . We can see
Don Osito Marquina in the right upstairs window.
© Salvador Dalí, Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation, VEGAP
Toy Museum of Catalonia - Figueres
Social Object
Field Museum Chicago
The museum as a picture book
Photo by (c) Romina Mancuso
archeological museum - Barcelona, Spain
archeological museum - Patrasso, Greece
set up a story that can link all the museum
collection objects as part of a novel. Use
it a storyboard for the exposition.
United States
Holocaust Memorial
Museum
Washington, DC
Photo by (c) Romina Mancuso
Franco Cesana
Date of Birth: September 20, 1931
Place of Birth: Bologna, Italy
Franco was born to a Jewish family living in the northern
Italian city of Bologna. Even though a fascist leader, Benito
Mussolini, came to power in 1922, Bologna’s Jews continued
to live in safety. Like many Italian Jews, Franco’s family was
well integrated in Italian society. Franco attended public
elementary school.
1933-39: When Franco was 7, Mussolini enforced “racial” laws
against the Jews: Franco was expelled from school, and went
instead to a Jewish school hastily organized in makeshift
quarters in one of Bologna’s synagogues. Franco could not
understand why he had to leave his friends just because he was
Jewish. His father died in 1939, and he moved with his
mother and older brother, Lelio, to Turin, where he began
religious school.
1940-44: Mussolini was overthrown in July 1943. Two months
later, German forces occupied Italy, and gained control of the
north, the part where Franco’s family and most of Italy’s Jews
lived. The Italians had been protecting the Jews, but now
Germany controlled Italy. The Cesana family went into hiding
in the mountains. To evade the Germans, they moved from
hut to hut. Lelio joined the Justice and Liberty partisan group.
Though only 12, Franco joined as well, proud that so many
Jews were fighting in the Italian resistance.
Franco was shot by Germans while on a scouting mission in
the mountains. His body was returned to his mother on his
13th birthday. He was Italy’s youngest partisan.
Copyright (c) by the United States Holocaust Memorial Council
Sophie Weisz
Date of Birth: February 23, 1927
Place of Birth: Valea-lui-Mihai,
Romania
Sophie was born to a prosperous Jewish family in a village near
the Hungarian border known for its winemaking and carriage
wheel industries. The village had many Jewish merchants. Her
father owned a lumber yard. Sophie loved to dance in the large
living room of their home as her older sister, Agnes, played the
piano.
1933-39: My father believed in a Jewish homeland and sent
money to Palestine to plant trees and establish settlements
there. When I was 10, I was sent to a school in nearby Oradea
because our village had only elementary schools. I missed my
family, but studied hard, and swam and ice skated for fun.
Though we heard about the roundups of Jews after the
Germans invaded Poland in 1939, we felt safe in Romania.
1940-44: Hungary annexed our region in 1940; by mid-1941
they’d joined the German forces. We were forced into the
Oradea ghetto in May 1944, and then deported to Auschwitz.
In August my mother, sister and I were moved hundreds of
miles north to Stutthof on the Baltic coast for forced labor.
The prisoners were asked to entertain the German soldiers at
Christmas; I danced to the music of the ballet Coppelia in a
costume fashioned from gauze and paper. I earned extra food
for this, and shared it with my sister Agnes.
Sophie and her sister escaped while on a forced march in
February 1945. Her mother and father perished in the camps.
In February 1949 Sophie emigrated to the United States.
Copyright (c) by the United States Holocaust Memorial Council
Manhattan, New York – U.S.A.:
Tenement Museum,
Antonio Molina’s book Windows on
Manhattan
How to be attractive for journalists,
bloggers, social media users? offering
them a yummy story.
Asian Art Museum - San
Francisco
Istanbul – Turkey:
“Museum of Innocence” book
Orhan Pamuk museum project
Orhan Pamuk was the Nobel Prize winner for literature in 2006
Literature field is by itself a mine of emotions:
illustration by:Romina Mancuso
the stories narrated, the fantastic characters that are still
making dream the lectors all over the world, the places and
objects described in their pages are extraordinary, powerful
tool of experiential communication. Starting from a novel
book story, or from a novel main character, is possible to rewrite a story that can attract visitors inside a museum and
helps their orienteering inside the exhibition.
Theming puts people in a receptive mood
and keeps them from feeling embarrassed
or silly. All the elements of a movie must
be made to complement each other and
this criterion was adapted in designing the
parks. It’s a concept of relating things in a
non-competitive way (Walt Disney)