My newest video focuses on diversity in the ancient art of Berlin’s Altes Museum. It offers a perfect chance to collect some of the wonderful resources that museums are putting out to reach their diverse audiences, and to draw attention to this pressing issue. Here is a brief collection of some of my favorites. Please comment below with further ideas!

  • The Myseum of Toronto is a paragon of Community Responsive Programming. This museum doesn’t even have a building – it consists purely of initiatives that go out into the community to make a difference!
  • I love the idea of a Social Justice Curator. Jasmine Wahi at the Bronx Museum of the Arts is making use of this position by putting on exhibitions and much more about pressing social issues. One statement in her interview for ArtNews struck me in particular: “The paintings Khari [Turner, artist] showed me were saturated with color, and evoked a sense of jubilation. Moments of joy are so important right now: social justice in art is not just about illustrating injustice. It’s also about fighting for our right to be joyful.” Check out the Bronx Museum’s list of social justice resources here.
  • The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow put untold thought, passion, and resources into reaching their community during the pandemic. They particularly built up their programming for autistic and hearing-impaired visitors. Inspiring not just for our vision of museums, but of humanity!

The video “White at the Museum” by the Lucas Brothers (shown on Full Frontal with Samantha Bee) is a highly entertaining look at the very serious subject of whitewashing Greek and Roman art. It is exactly the right dose of academic learning mixed with social responsibility and, yes, humor.

Have you discovered other ways that museums are using to prioritize diversity and community inclusion? Let us know below in the comments!