Paper short abstract:

Adopting a situational approach, this article examines a social phenomenon associating a heritage institution and a social movement in Brazil. Our story begins at the National Historical Museum of Rio de Janeiro, where two ambigous standpoints are at stake.

Paper long abstract:

Situational analysis is widely referred to and applied in anthropology. This article adopts this analytical tradition to examine a social phenomenon associating a heritage institution and a social movement in Brazil. Our story begins on an interactional scale at the National Historical Museum of Rio de Janeiro, where a new permanent exhibition is being presented.

Conceived from eviction debris, result of the destruction of a poor neighborhood during the works for Rio 2016 Olympics, the new exhibition was presented as a turning point. The resignification of the eviction ruins would uphold the beginning of a new curatorship approach, advocating for a common construction of Brazilian republican history. Rejecting the perspective of innate fundamental rights, the new exhibition would instead raise-awareness on the how rights fulfillment is dependent on multiple citizen struggles.

To understand the relational depth that the situation evokes, the article retraces its genealogy to examine the long and conflictual trail of “heritage action” embodied in the exhibited debris. The decrypted system of relations is, subsequently, intertwined with the notions of discourse and power in order to demonstrate two ambiguous standpoints embedded in our situation: the potential of urban contestations in the preservation of the memory of the dispossessed, and in a deeper ground, the dawn of a new dominant tradition upon the failure of citizen utopias.

Paper short abstract:

The paper presents the eminence of a Romani masquerade group in Bulgaria that reclaims its own identity through heritage. It is argued that Roma try to renegotiate national heritage, by contesting on a performative level the exclusive concept of the nation and its supposedly homogeneous culture.

Paper long abstract:

Recently Bulgaria has been witnessing a real upsurge in the revitalization of rural masking traditions. Known as kukeri or survakari, many groups of masked people perform annually in numerous villages and small towns all over the country. This rite is extremely prestigious for the national imagery, and one of its regional versions has been nominated by the Bulgarian state and consequently inscribed on the UNESCO ICH Representative List. Alongside with local customs, in several towns municipal authorities organize major festival parades with thousands of participants where groups from different places gather to perform their respective traditions and compete.

In this context, the paper traces the consolidation of a whole Romani mummer group - a case which challenges the normative canon of masquerade, by transforming some of its elements into sign-vehicles of an ethnic self-representation. In the light of Critical heritage studies and Critical Romani studies, I examine both Roma participation and agency, as well their framing and othering. Since masquerade is taken by Bulgarians (in ethnic terms) as their possession, the "access" of Roma to the same heritage is not always granted.

Based on fieldwork among a Romani community in a small Bulgarian town, I analyze the strategies that Roma use to challenge the dominant discourse of the national majority and its heritage. I hypothesize that they recognize the potential of masking, appropriate the requirements set from above and adapt themselves to the situation, in order to dialogize and negotiate the exclusive concept of culture and redefine it afterwards.

Paper short abstract:

In April 2021, the 41 m2 tableau of Tamás Péli will be exhibited in the Budapest History Museum, in the framework of the Off-Biennale, being the largest independent arts initiative in Hungary. This exhibition will be ground-breaking for multiple reasons: Roma art is rarely represented in such prestigious public institutions in Hungary and this painting has been invisible now for several years.

Paper long abstract:

This paper presents the processes of exhibiting one of the most significant Roma artworks in Hungary: the Birth tableau of Tamás Péli. Péli, who, in contrast with most autodidact Roma artists, graduated from the Royal Academy of Visual Arts in Amsterdam, created in 1983 a large painting for the orphanage in Tiszadob. This foster home was the largest in state-socialist Hungary and for the Roma children living there, Péli’s mythical painting signified a tool for cultural identification; as Péli explained: “I was able to create this myth of birth among people who did not even consider their own birth a part of their identity”. When the orphanage in Tiszadob closed, the painting was moved to the storehouse of a regional museum in Northern Hungary and therefore, remained invisible since then. With the exhibition of the tableau next year, there will be new possibilities for a greater visibility, revalorisation and re-interpretation. The paper examines the cultural-historic context of the painting, its ambiguous role in a dictatorial regime and the questions that its re-exhibition poses in the more general context of minority heritage-making. The introduction of the painting in the hybrid collaboration of a public museum and an independent, bottom-up initiative, creating a discursive space, will contribute to the analysis of tensions between minority heritage and mainstream cultural canon and to the questioning of cultural democracy in different political regimes, in which, despite of various cultural policies, Roma cultural heritage still lacks recognition.

Paper short abstract:

In a series of open, reflexive conversations, the members of the committee of experts co-curating a collaborative exhibition on Roma cultures and populations, analyze the representation of Roma populations in a selection of items in Mucem’s collections and, more broadly, French national heritage.

Paper long abstract:

The Musée des Civilisations d’Europe et de la Méditerranée (Mucem) in Marseille is currently preparing an exhibition on Roma cultures co-creatively with representatives of national and international Roma populations. In the context of this collaborative effort, the objects and pieces of art contained in Mucem’s collection up to date are assessed following a (self-)critical rationale. Who produced them and in which circumstances were they acquired or collected? How did they join the museum’s collections, following which interests and politics? Along which lines must a contextualization be undertaken, with the aim to display these items with an ethical and inclusive positioning? While it is the museum’s intention to break with colonial and hegemonial norms in collection and curation practices, it is the Roma experts’ turn to forge a narrative that takes a critical stance regarding the gaze on these populations perceived as ‚Others‘. In the context of the exhibition project, a selection of items related to Roma were proposed for critical examination to the Roma experts. In an experimental, open format they were asked to enter individual conversations with the objects, comment, joke, or analyze them following the meanings they contain, contesting the heritage they represent for themselves and their respective communities, and contributing to the re-shaping of collective and curation practices. This paper proposes an ethnographical account of the heritage agency expressed through the access to material collections and their re-appropriation by the experts, as well as the resulting reactions, responses, and dialogues with the museum’s professionals.