Paper short abstract:

Open Museum Project is an initiative by the Ribadavia’s Ethnological Museum (Ourense- Spain). This project brings cultural heritage and the functions of the museum closer to groups that do not have an easy access to a museum or other cultural activities. It is a determined step towards the inclusion.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper, we discuss the experience under the Open Museum Program. The aim of the program is to bring cultural heritage and the functions of the museum closer to groups that do not have an easy access to a museum or other cultural activities. The program's goal is to show the particular visions of three groups, as well as to present to them the cultural heritage the museum works on.

The program implements workshops designed specifically for three groups: inmates from the jail of Pereiro de Aguiar, Alzheimer patients who attend the workshops from the association AFAOR from Ourense (Spain), and learning impaired people who are cared for at the Red Cross day centre in Ribadavia (Ourense- Spain).

Each of these groups and organisations we work with needs a tailored design in order to work with the Museum's heritage. Therefore, the Museum staff develops every year three different workshops targeting each of these groups, and following the same topic related to the Museum's collection.

So this experience is showing us that it can be appropriate to work with ethnographic collections for the mixed public. Even more since its objective is to promote equality and to carry out activities which are aimed at inclusion and visualizing of excluded groups.