THE ONCE AND FUTURE MUSEUM

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THE ONCE AND


B
orn barely two centuries ago, the modern museum soon evolved into an institution devoted to charting the course of progress—in science and technology, art, national history, and other realms. Now scholars and curators are questioning some of the assumptions behind this approach. Is history a grand march of progress, or is it something more complex and nuanced? What is a museum for? Some trends suggest a triumph of form over content. Cities around the world are erecting

FUTURE MUSEUM


spectacular museum buildings that lack an essential ingredient of traditional institutions: a permanent collection. Our authors trace the history of the museum and ponder its prospects as it seeks to explain the past to the present while pointing us toward the future.

52 Museums and the Democratic Order by Miriam R. Levin 66 The Museum as Artifact by Jayne Merkel