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MUSEUM ONLINE

Project duration: 1995–2009

The idea behind MUSEUM ONLINE is to promote the cooperation between museums and schools by the use of innovative technology. The application of new ways of communication and information technology represents a substantial component of the project.

Since 1995 more than 460 schools all over Austria have participated in MUSEUM ONLINE. They worked in cooperation with their partner schools as well as numerous museums, art and cultural institutions in Austria and abroad.

By now MUSEUM ONLINE has already successfully established itself as an active platform which enables museums and schools to get in contact with each other and at the same time to maintain a juvenile perspective on our cultural heritage.

MUSEUM ONLINE is not only addressed to information technology teachers but also – bearing in mind its emphasis on cultural and artistic contents – to teachers of fine arts. MUSEUM ONLINE aims at motivating these teachers to benefit from the possibilities offered by multi-media, which prepare the ground for the merging of contents, techniques and aesthetics; it should also encourage teachers to explore experimental, new and modern approaches to conveying cultural heritage.

Meeting with Great Response

Despite objections claiming that elementary schools do not dispose of the necessary technical requirements, it has to be mentioned that an increasing number of elementary schools have been participating in MUSEUM ONLINE in recent years. It is precisely this age group which responds with great enthusiasm when dealing with regional and cultural heritage.

Haptic and Virtual World

The students attending the secondary school in Golling in Lower Austria documented a range of so-called "minor monuments" of their home village; among these are chapels, wells, façade- and gable figures, sculptures, street monuments, memorial stones and commemorative plaques and gates. Moreover, they also engaged in the renovation of small chapels under the direction of experts. This blend of the haptic and virtual worlds is characteristic for many projects of MUSEUM ONLINE. Young "media-freaks" are particularly successful in achieving a synthesis between computer-technical possibilities and traditional-creative modes of expression at those points where their own life situations can flow into the project. For instance the virtual galleries which were successfully created by the SPZ Unterweissenbach in order to promote their computer-generated works: The severely handicapped children orient themselves by copying and alienating the paintings of the "great masters" according to their perception of the paintings and their models (the great masters). Another exemplary case would be that young people are in search of answers to the following question: "What do museums offer to young people?" A solution is provided by the "Culture4youth-Club", set up in cooperation with the Joanneum Museum on the initiative of the students of the BHAK (school for trade and commerce) Grazbachgasse.

A different approach to the question would be the one adopted by the HBLA (school for commerce and tourism) Ursprung; the school turns into a branch office of the museum. In cooperation with the "House of Nature" the HBLA carried out research on a project about genetic engineering and used the scientific data for the development of computer games.

An Open-ended Artistic-Creative Process

During the past years, MUSEUM ONLINE has developed from a small-scale regional project into a cross-border international project. No matter whether the schools explore their immediate environment and document it on the Web or whether they cooperate with schools from abroad, there is one thing all this work has in common: The recognition and the development of new modes of expression, the interactive communication between schools and the "outside world" and getting involved in an open-ended artistic-creative process.

Summary of achievements to date

The objective of MUSEUM ONLINE is it to enable pupils and teachers – within the scope of project teaching – to engage in intensive analysis of regional, national and international art and culture; participants are furthermore enabled to get involved in thorough investigations concerning world cultural heritage (UNESCO) as well as dealing with information and communication technologies. MUSEUM ONLINE therefore consciously pursues an interdisciplinary approach. Pupils and teachers in cooperation with qualified representatives of museums and arts, and cultural institutions gather and compile suitable contents which are then presented in a multi-lingual way on the Internet. Dealing with questions of diverse aspects, such as technical innovative, art-historical or museum-oriented matters is required.

Achieved until now

More than 460 web projects carried out by children of all ages
More than 130 museums and other cultural institutions involved
Encouragement of project-based education
International partnerships (between schools and museums)
Encouragement of communication, in-service training, creativity and ICT skills
Fun by dealing with new technologies and cultural heritage

Contact

KulturKontakt Austria
Universitätsstraße 5
A-1010 Wien
t +43 1 523 87 65-0
f +43 1 523 87 65-20
www.kulturkontakt.or.at

Elisabeth Breuss
t +43 1 523 87 65-70
elisabeth.breuss@kulturkontakt.or.at

Petra Meeraus
t +43 1 523 87 65-13
petra.meeraus@kulturkontakt.or.at