Tell me a story! Storytelling for museum branding.

MUSEUM MARKETING HOT TOPICS

Academic and research conference

the State Museum of the History of Religion.

St Petersburg 24-26 October 2013

Romina Mancuso

(illustra

tion: R

om

ina M

ancuso)

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.

1926 Anna Maria and Salvador Dalì with Don Osito

Marquina. Photo by Joan Xirau in the Dalì’s studio in Figueres (MJC/F)

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

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

archeological museum - Barcelona, Spain

archeological museum - Patrasso, Greece

Photo

by (

c)

Rom

ina M

ancuso

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

illu

str

atio

n b

y:R

om

ina M

ancuso

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)

Literature field is by itself a mine of emotions:

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 re-

write a story that can attract visitors inside a museum and

helps their orienteering inside the exhibition.