An important point, in this moment of renewal, of the museum system with the use of funds of the PNRR it is also the question of the purpose, of the life purpose the museum.
We maintain the conservative function of cataloguing, intermediation, communication and presentation of the cultural offer for the various communities as acquired and consolidated. Today this purpose can be improved and expanded thanks to technology. If, briefly, it can be said that the museum's role is to make people learn, it could also be argued that it can be done by entertaining. If learning is expanded with augmented reality and new technologies, the museum experience should benefit by spreading a more complete and detailed message and meaning.
The reality of cultural consumption is that they compete with entertainment consumption and both are in high demand and pulsating in the consumption attributes of the new and old generations. If you use influencers to attract new consumers in museums (Ferragni, Uffizi Gallery) you are most likely doing more contemporary cultural marketing, but still insufficient. Today the visitor seeks unique experiences, multi-sensory and multi-dimensional to experience new emotions and pleasure. It must be admitted that, for a large part of visitors, going to the museum is like going to a football match or going out to dinner: research is the positive, memorable, unforgettable, recountable, postable emotion. These topics come full force into the search for those emotional dividends which play a vital role today. Cultural management, in using these technologies, could be afraid of a commodification of its virtuous and qualitative product. In my view, it shouldn't. The relationship between learning and entertainment should not be seen as conflicting and in opposition, but in conjunction and in addition to deliver that unique and unforgettable experience so craved. I like to give the example of visits with augmented reality and video mapping of the Ara Pacis in Rome, unfortunately suspended due to the covid. The basic idea was to show "how it was" and "where it was" that technology has made possible. This narrative depth offered an unusual view capable of transporting the visitor into the historical era and making him experience the building as and where it was positioned.
The point is not the alteration of the cultural artefact or the work of art, but the expansion of its history, its identity, its meaning with the multi-experiential assistance of the museum visit. The goals are training and learning even through entertainment. After all, these reasoning largely fall within the new trends of listening, dialogue and resilience that are necessary today to respond to market rules and to be more attractive and fascinating.
Unfortunately that's not enough. The cultural industry will have to make a greater effort to address the issue of innovation in its offer, working mainly on the substance of the product to make it more pleasant, more usable and more accessible. This is also the frontier of cultural change projected to the next generations and based on the bridge between past and future. “If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have answered: a faster horse.”Henry Ford
All the Best!
