Paper short abstract:

This paper focuses on the mediation of artistic heritage through social media practices. I argue that digital participation needs to be examined in relation to the actors' implicit media knowledge. My research investigates how personal narratives challenge established routines of art interpretation.

Paper long abstract:

"My generation is accused of not being interested in culture, museums or art, but actually we want to be more than just visitors, we want to be a persisting part of this world (...)." This excerpt from a conversation about the rather controversial hashtag #museumselfieday directly addresses the key-argument of this paper: Digital image technologies and visually shaped platforms such as Instagram prompt new practices of participation in the context of artistic heritage, which in many cases challenge established practices of perception, appreciation and valuation.

Based on my ethnographic research within the DFG-funded project "Curating Digital Images", I argue that it is in particular the habit of using Instagram (and related social-media-platforms or forums) for everyday communication that contributes to the mediation of artistic heritage on the basis of exchange and participation. The emerging practices of digital participation in museum spaces are therefore not only understood as influenced and shaped by the digital infrastructures but also as integrated into broader socio-cultural contexts and most crucially as based on incorporated knowledge and practical sense.

The detaching of artworks from their institutional framework creates the possibility to integrate the depicted objects into new, more personal narratives and alternative contexts. The participatory negotiation of meaning then withdraws the museum's sole control and its authority to define the "appropriate" interaction with art and art history. Therefore, digital participation and (re)contextualization of artistic heritage can be interpreted as a practice of counterbalancing hegemonic structures.