Why are Museums about Writing so Interesting?

I’ve written before about the Bulgakov Museum in Kyiv, one of my favorite museums in Ukraine Just recently, I’ve been in two other museums devoted to writing and writers that made me consider why it is that museums about words are so good at using ideas, not just words, to convey their story. 

First, the Franz Kafka Museum in Prague.  A new museum, located right on the river, it’s a highly theatrical presentation of Kafka’s life and work in Prague.  Like most people, I know of Kafka, but am not terribly familiar with his work.  The exhibits do a great job of integrating his life, his work, and the city of Prague.   The museum is mostly in shades of gray, black and white,  and uses several theatrical devices to connect the story.  A curled scrim shows a ghostly rotating view of Yiddish theater;  a section about a circular life includes materials installed in flat circular cases, lit from above.  The women in Kafka’s life are highlighted in individual cases that are transparent from front to back, giving a sense of his complicated personal life.   At one point, you enter a dark narrow space filled with the reflective glass fronts of file cabinets and dotted with ringing phones.  You pick up the phones and someone is speaking.  The sense of futility, of no way out, is palpable.   It’s a pretty great installation when you leave wanting to read Kafka, as I did (but haven’t yet).

The Kafka Museum in Prague appears to have substantial resources but this week I visited another exhibit in a much smaller museum, with much more limited resources:  the Literature Museum in Kharkiv, Ukraine.  The museum was founded after the end of the Soviet Union and it is a great testament to that fact that ideas don’t cost money.Their permanent exhibit explores Ukrainian writers in the 20th century.    The exhibit carries a strong conception of the narrative of those writers and the changes brought both the advent and decline of the Soviet Union, and that conceptual strength is assisted by the inventive efforts of design students.  

This could have been an opportunity to see an exhibit that was just a big line-up of books.  But instead,  enormous photographs and a timeline line the full exhibit.  Each room looks at a different time period,  and the extended text labels about the books shown are not installed directly with the book, but contained in folders for browsing.

The last three rooms were the most memorable to me.   Ukrainians (and I believe I have this right) have a phrase describing those who go into themselves,  going into a “blue world.”  In this “blue world,’   photographs with blanks for faces show the writers who were imprisoned or killed.   In the next room, the Soviet story is in full sway:  Soviet leaders hover over a giant tower of Soviet books.  Around the walls of the room,  the top shelves show those the works of writers who prospered during the Soviet Union;  a lower shelf, those who accommodated; and the very bottom shelf,  the works of those who resisted.   But there’s a double meaning:  not only does that bottom shelf represent the suppressed writers, but said the exhibit's co-curator,  “it’s a little sign of respect as we bow down to look at them.”

The final room is dedicated to the post-Soviet period.  Hand-designed wall-paper includes images of today’s Ukrainian writers;  a suggestion of a coffeehouse, with notepaper replacing napkins in their ever-present holder and a television with books inside, all provide a way to consider the new world that independence has brought.  The world of ideas, the world inside a writer’s mind, is made real in all these exhibitions.  We had a lively discussion, in a café, about whether this was because writer’s museums are about ideas and other museums are just about objects—what do you think?

Returning

The past couple weeks I've learned about several different situations that involve return:  return to a homeland, return of collections, return or reclaiming of identity.  I'm currently in Crimea and will write more soon about the Crimean Tatars,  but wanted to share a bit about the Lobkowicz Collection in Prague, a quite amazing and complicated story about nationalism, pride, and return.   The Lobkowicz family were one of the richest and most powerful families in Bohemia, and by extension, in Central Europe for more than 300 hundred years.  They were art collectors (Brueghel and Canaletto, to name just two artists), and patrons of music (Beethoven and Hayden, to name just two composers).   Hereditary titles were abolished in 1918, with the founding of the Czech Republic,  so there were no more Prince Lobkowiczs.  However,  the last prince was active in the Czech national movement and served as an ambassador to Great Britain for the Czech government in exile during World War II.  The Nazis confiscated the family's vast collections and many castles, including the palace at Prague Castle.   After the war, the buildings and palaces were returned, but all too soon,  the family fled to American with nothing after the Communist take-over of Czechoslovakia in 1948.

But the 20th century wasn't quite done dealing the Lobkowicz family surprises.  The Velvet Revolution of 1989 included legislation to return assets taken more than 40 years before.  So, finally, the family, now fully settled in the United States, receives back more than a dozen castles and vast archival and object collections of immeasurable value. One reason for the return was (very interesting to me as I see Ukraine) rapid re-investment and revitalization of the country.   Those more than a dozen castles were too many to restore, so most were sold and the family has concentrated their efforts in the Palace at Prague Castle and at Nelahozeves,  a chateau in the country, both of which I had a chance to visit.  In addition, David Krol, Deputy Director of Visitor Services was good enough to spend time over coffee chatting with me about the projects underway.

The audio tour at the Palace is narrated by family members, including William, now living in Prague full time with his family and running what is not an NGO, but a private enterprise (but the objects were returned under an agreement with the Czech government that forbids their sale).   The audio tour, available in multiple languages, is free with your admission.   I loved hearing the family story--but absolutely the most touching part to me,  is the sole room of narration by  the family member (sorry, my notes fail me here) who remembers the palace depicted in the paintings as a child and talks about how he, now in his 80s,  never could have imagined that he would ever return, ever be able to walk those halls again.   In some ways, it's hard to imagine being the family who commissions Beethoven sonatas and purchases Canalettos,  but that one voice made the entire family seem human;  made it a story not only about Princely Collections, but a touching one about place, family, loss, and return.

Nelahozeves (above)  is different--the Palace at Prague Castle is installed as galleries;  but Nelahozeves is a series of period rooms.  I'm not a huge decorative arts fan, and we took the tour with a Czech speaking guide and an English handout,  but I loved visiting.   I'm unclear about the process used to recreate the period rooms, but they seemed lively in a way rooms often do not,  due both to the great collections, but also to a creative curatorial hand.  In Prague, you met the family through their art and patronage,  at Nelahozeves you met the family through their more domestic lives--their library, a true cabinet of curiousities,  a small family chapel, and a quite amazing gun room and hallway.

Needless to say,  all this work is an expensive undertaking.  There's a beautiful gift shop, a lively cafe, spaces are rented for events,  a daily concert outsourced to others, a small but growing membership program, a US based non-profit, and of course admissions to help support the project.  Interesting to me though, is the fact that this is a family enterprise.  In one way,  it makes me wonder about the future--what if the next generation of Lobkowiczs doesn't have the same commitment to the nation, and the collections?  But at the same time, a committed, passionate ownership, supplemented by a very small staff, gives the museums considerably more flexibility and agility than many museums, including those non-profit ones and particularly, the governmental ones that I see here in Ukraine.

This, and several other museums in Prague made me wonder about the future of the often hide-bound and stiflingly bureaucratic museums in post-Soviet nations.  Will those government museums become less and less important as they are unable to change, to respond to change, and reach out to audiences?  Will private museums (also springing up here)  become the places that visitors go to and funders support?  Does that lead to a downward spiral for museums that can't adapt and survive?   What kinds of legislation would help governmental museums compete with private museums?  In a society where corruption remains a significant issue, like Ukraine, would private museums be more or less liable to corruption?  What questions does it raise for you?

So although part of the Lobkowicz story is about the past;  the return of what once was, it is equally about the story about the future, of both the family and the Czech Republic.  It strikes me that looking forward, in a democratic society, might make the very aristocratic Max Lobkowicz (below via the museum's website),  the last prince and Czech patriot, very proud.

What a Difference A Decade (or Two) Makes

Last week, I went to Prague, a city I had last visited in 1992,  when it was still emerging from decades of Communist rule.  Now, I found a city greatly changed.  Our last visit was in December, so it was cold and gray--virtually no hotels (we rented a room in someone's apartment),  not much English anywhere,  but beautifully,  it seemed as if we heard classical music streaming forth from many windows as we walked along.

Prague today is a thoroughly European city and you can see evidence of the vast influx of European funds into the city--which combined with the efforts of the Czechs themselves, have created  a city that is friendly and easy for visitors.  And there are many, many, visitors.  I remember wandering Prague Castle almost alone, just the three of us.  And on Friday, in the pouring rain, hordes of tourists from around the world were on tour there.   

New museums have opened with private funds:  Lobkowicz Palace, the Kafka Museum, and the Kampe Museum--all new (more posts to come).  Exhibit panels and labels are done in Czech and English, at a minimum, but also often available in German, Russian, French, Japanese and Spanish, reflecting the city's lure to visitors from all over.  But of course, you walk two steps off the main tourist areas and you can immediately be on a beautiful, quiet street,  a place to think about Prague, not about souvenirs or pizza (or the great cheap beer!)

What does this mean for cultural tourism in Ukraine?  There are several important lessons, I believe.

Government involvement does matter.  For instance, the Lobkowicz Collection was returned to its owners through an agreement with Vaclev Havel's first government.  Clearly the government continues to invest in culture and tourism, and encourages others to invest.

If government-run museums do not become forward thinking and active,  private museums (whether NGOs or not) will spring up and make those government museums irrelevant to both visitors and the community.  The result will also be declining financial support, both governmental and from the private sector.

Making materials available in multiple languages is a key way to make visitors welcome--and perhaps on some level, the least expensive to create.  At one castle we visited,  the English speaking guide was not available,  but an English language handout was.  And at the tiny, tiny,  Antonin Dvorak Museum in a village,  they had a simply typed English language brochure and had added number keys to the exhibits and panels.  Otherwise, I would have never appreciated the pen that he wrote with!   I often feel badly when I tell people that materials should be in English, rather than other languages, but many, if not most, western European travelers speak English well--so it's not just for native English speakers.

Collaboration makes a difference.  Whether you're partnering with the city government to produce a river extravaganza or with another gallery or museum to mount a joint show,  these collaborative efforts draw more attention and make resources go further.

Outdoor contemporary art installations become attractions in themselves.  All over Prague, contemporary art makes you look, sometimes makes you laugh, but creates a lively, active sense of the city.  Such efforts, I assume, require extensive collaborations between artist, funder and the city.

Care for the beautiful place you live.  The center of Prague felt like a place people cared about.  Architecture is preserved, and the spaces are made for people (although there is a huge amount of graffiti that tempers this statement a bit)  Here in Kyiv, now, cars rule.  They park on the sidewalk;  you walk underground while they travel unimpeded.  In Prague, it felt like a walker's city.   I'll assume also that this has to do with less corruption in terms of land deals as well as other policies.

Just as I was telling Irina about my memory of music,  we walked by a conservatory, and sure enough, a young singer's voice sprang forth from an upper floor--a brief snatch of song, followed by an instructor's comments, and the singer began again.   For me, a memory of a long ago visit made real again.  Despite the many tourists,  Prague still remains a beautiful place particularly when, like last week,  all the chestnuts were in bloom.