For Taiwan's museums, the phenomenon from the past decade that is most worth studying is the special exhibits that have been brought to the island from overseas. In fact, these large-scale foreign exhibits have repeatedly created a sensation in Taiwan, with hundreds of thousands or even millions of visitors visiting them. This in turn has broadened local museums' international perspectives and has initiated a social trend of visiting local museums, helping these museums to attract more visitors.
Behind this cheerful phenomenon, however, some are worried that the trend may be harmful, leading local museums to choose foreign exhibits over local ones, exhibitions over research, temporary exhibits over permanent ones, numbers of visitors over the quality of their visits and a management concept that emphasizes colonialism and commercialism.
A recent hearing regarding whether the National Palace Museum (
If we return to the fundamentals and examine the mission of a museum, we will see that as a non-profit institution -- which takes preservation of cultural assets and promotion of social welfare as its primary goals -- a museum has an unavoidable social responsibility to preserve, maintain, study and display its collections, as well as to promote the public's perception of art, science and history. As a museum worker, I am not so naive as to hope that museums can get rid of all political and economic influences. Both respect for museum pieces and responsibility to the public, however, should always be a museum's ultimate goal, to be taken as the focus of professional museological ethics.
First, let's talk about a museum's respect for its collections. If a museum fails to actively build its own style and develop regular displays or educational activities based on this style, it will lack the necessary conditions for a sustainable operation. I am not denying the value of foreign exhibits, but stress they should only be held to benefit the regular operation of the local museum.
In leading museologist G. Ellis Burcaw's classic book Introduction to Museum Work, which is regarded as one of the leading texts on museology, the author portrays special exhibits as "Christmas presents" for visitors, or even glamorous gimmicks designed for the purpose of marketing. They should only take place occasionally and should not become a norm in museum operations. Otherwise, what is the difference between a museum and a department store or even the Taipei World Trade Center (台北世貿中心), which frequently holds temporary exhibits?
Second, let's talk about a museum's responsibility to the public. Whether a museum's operation is successful is not simply judged by the number of visitors it receives. There are three stages in modern museum education: to attract visitors, to keep the visitors and to inspire them to learn. A museum which only tries to attract visitors and does not keep the quality of their visits in mind will be unable to keep the visitors, much less provide a meaningful learning experience for them. Such a museum's future is questionable. A museum earns its value in its long-term existence and its function as a cultural index. If a museum is shortsighted and curries favor by trying to impress the public, it will be to the detriment of Taiwan's educational business.
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