CAPABILITY OF DEVELOPMENT OF SMALL MUSEUMS OF UBEKISTAN.THE DESIRABLE AND THE REACHABLE
CAPABILITY OF DEVELOPMENT OF SMALL MUSEUMS OF UZBEKISTAN.THE DESIRABLE AND THE REACHABLE
Inessa Finkelshtein
Independent candidate of the Kamoliddin Behzod National Institute of Arts and Design,
Uzbekistan, Tashkent
ABSTRACT
This article is about the development and reforms of institutions in transitional periods through the analysis of the history of memorial museums in Tashkent. Apart from other museums, the author took the memorial museum of a great Uzbek actress - Tamara Khanum, as positive experience, which give hope to see development of such institutions.
Keywords: developing, modern, digital, culture, memorial museums, Tamara Khanum.
At the end of the 80s, there was a transitional period on the territory of the Soviet, now post-Soviet space, which continues to this day and is accompanied by an increase in a certain background of problems. «May you live in interesting times» said the ancient Chinese sages. Much later, European sociology acquired the term anomie, which literally means “without norms”. Any society falls into such a state during a period of serious change, when the old system of norms, formal and informal, collapses – but the new system is only being created. The transitional period is associated with the emergence of a strategy of transit or reforms.
The efficiency of transit and consistent viability of institutions are the two main components of prolonged development. The logic of the transplantation of institutions as a transit strategy that has existed so far stems from the many thousands of years of practice of transferring objects of material, and then by extension non - material culture. Unfortunately, the efficiency of transplanting institutions in the 20th century turned out to be fantastically low.
Transformation of museum institutions and its development had a number of difficulties, the methods to overcome which began to emerge only in recent years, without being a systematic reform plan that claims to be a program package of effective measures to reorganize the industry. Moreover, even the most powerful developers of the museum sphere, for example the director of the Pushkin State museum of fine art, Irina Antonova, once expressed fears that in the modern world, museums are becoming some kind of a leviathan, the most likely further development of which is a dive to rock bottom.
Two vectors are of fundamental importance during reforms in this field in the midst of a transition period - saving museum collections from “plunging to rock bottom” and returning them to a media space, a space of real interest of a proven and even previously impossible part of the audience. The history and practice of the above stated through the example of the network of so-called small museums in the city of Tashkent seems to be of particular interest in this context.
If it is presumed that in cities-memorials, ‘small museums’ are situated in the most preserved and functionally suitable historical architectural sites, then in our case it refers to a network of memorial houses-museums of prominent cultural figures of Uzbekistan, which is located in the appropriate lifetime dwellings of these figures. Museums allow, through the prism of their personality and through the material remains of their life, to make judgements about the times in general, and the significance of the creative’s work considered in a given historical era.
In total, this network included, until recently, 11 museums created at the end of the last century. Two of them were closed during the reconstruction of some areas of the city due to the lack of places to transfer their expositions. Among the remaining nine, four are the museums of famous Uzbek writers founded posthumously to Kakhkhar, Gulyam, Borodin, Aibek. One belongs to the artist Tansykbaev, and two are the museums of the composers Rajabi and Ashrafi. All of the above authors represented the same era, place and time of creativity. Museums, having preserved the atmosphere that existed during their work in the lifetime apartments of the creators, popularize their names and efforts.
The ninth museum, unique in many ways, is the Museum of Tamara Khanum - world famous Uzbek dancer, singer and collector of folklore. The museum is unique, firstly, because it was opened during the lifetime of the actress. The museum also contrasts sharply with other museums in terms of the nature of the exposition. Originally when it was created, it was called a permanent exhibition of costumes. Tamara Khanum performed songs in eighty-six languages of the world, accompanying them with appropriate folk dances, while wearing stage costumes from all continents the collection contains unique stage costumes of the peoples of all continents. Historical rarities that were the gifts of state heads, sewn, embroidered and decorated especially for this charismatic personality, who never ceased to amaze the audience in her fifty years of concert activity.
The director of the museum is the dancer G. Hamrayeva, who worked at the museum from the first day of its establishment. Through her efforts, a grant was received which allowed the museum to recapture the once lost interest of the audience, and breathe new life into the exposition.
These financial resources empowered a group of professionals to remold the archaic atmosphere of the museum into a form that is more adequate to the requirements of the youthful and dynamic audience, by completing the exposition in accordance with the times, and by multiplying opportunities for communication and excursion activities. Their efforts resulted in the transformation of the exposition and collection of the museum, returning the name of this historical person into the media space.
For more than two years, the museum was in a state of reorganization, which included: digitalizing all of the material that were in its possession, connecting to the internet, development of a web-site for the purpose of widespread popularization of the digitalized materials for users all across the world, creation and duplication of two types of multimedia product, re-exposition of the existing museum spaces, and the creation of an additional exposition hall in accordance with the updated concept of the museum.
The concept of the re-exposition arose from a simple and viable idea; Tamara Khanum is the predecessor of the glamor hierarchy. The new exposition reframed the image of the actress as a star, going against the fact that in the Soviet Union, the institution of stardom hadn’t existed at all. This sentence was also the phrase printed on billboards for the opening of the renovated exhibition, which relates to the fact that the ability of the star to reach the audience directly depends on the place of the star in the glamor hierarchy, in which she was the one and only.
The word glamor had a mystical meaning from its original use in the 17th century, and it came back into popular use in Hollywood, where the word peaked in the 40’s of the 20th century, all the while Tamara Khanum was already a star with all the privileges of this position. In fifteen years, she went from an unknown folk dancer who had to be secretly led away from concerts so that she wouldn't be stoned for the simple fact that she participated in live performances with an uncovered face in a country lacking theater as an art form, to being world-renowned, and having received an award from the British queen herself in 1935. It's impossible to let such prominent passionarty be discounted and slip into oblivion.
According to the new concept, the exposition in the large hall requires a number of steps to be taken. Costumes had to be attributed and classified, the number of exponents had to be increased, and they had to be placed in an interior filled with material objects corresponding to the time and place of origin of each of the costumes, in order for the costume exhibition to live its complete life.
Installations showing the achievements of Tamara Khanum during her long artistic career will help to feel the globality of this phenomenon in exposition areas that are local in size. They are thought out in such a way that the spirit of the actress is presented in them in its entirety, while at the same time meeting modern requirements for the level of presentation of objects of material culture.
The small hall, already able to receive the audience, has created a space for the personality of the actress in the museum, where photography has become the main visual element, killing the momentary and reviving the past. The exposition of the small hall of the museum is rooted in memory of the historical meetings of Tamara Khanum with other historical figures of the 20th century.
Its design is based on the general style already existing in the exhibition, but the style is being used as a starting point to innovate upon, using new materials and types of museum communication to become the leading part of the exhibition, paving a clear storyline for the viewer to follow through the entire life of the actress. The structure of the small hall, done in the most aesthetically pleasing golden yellow colors and provided its compactness, made it possible to fit in a historically accurate succession of milestones from the creative, social and personal life of Tamara Khanum. The labeling is made in the form of wear-resistant nameplates instead of the customary glued-on pieces of paper which were usually appropriate for soviet times, which creates a feeling of fundamentality.
The exposition includes thousands of photographs and a number of options for working with them, such as: viewing wall - mounted photographs, working with albums of archives of touring activities previously inaccessible to viewers, familiarization with multimedia product, which includes the entirety of the museum's digitized materials, that being photographs, documents, videos and audio materials.
Material proof included in the interior of the exposition, such as a gramophone and sets of records, in use by the actress in the process of working on dances and songs, create an indescribable feeling of the viewer's involvement in the created atmosphere. The original drawings of the actress, which she made in the process of working on costumes and numbers, were returned to the viewer. Not being a professional draftsman, she left us exclusively original samples of another component of the creative diversity of her talent.
The entrance of the museum with the help of large light boxes is organized in such a way that the previously dark entrance, which had no corporate identity, has at once found powerful lighting in the form of 12 lamps and a stylishly designed information arrangement. Now passerby pedestrians can see two-meter-high posters that clearly indicate the purpose of the location and that invite them to pay a visit to the museum.
The new exposition is designed to promote the popularization of the figure of the actress and her place in the cultural history of Uzbekistan and the world as a whole. The creation of the exposition was equally based in scientific, aesthetic and technical principles, and being at the junction of work with a fund and museum communication, plans were maintained under strict accordance of all components that make it up: exposition equipment, textures, colors, lighting, and supergraphics, in order to fully perceive and create an organic unity of the exposition.
The support of the state, charitable institutions and the work of professional enthusiasts convincingly prove that progress in the renewal of museum institutions will return the rich cultural heritage of Uzbekistan to the bosom of world culture, which it has always been an integral part.
References:
- Антонова И. Музеи-левиафаны – это проблема. Электронный ресурс. https://snob.ru/selected/entry/61529
- Финкельштейн И.А. Возможности развития сотрудничества. Электронный ресурс. https://studylib.ru/doc/463832/finkel._shtejn-i.a.vozmozhnosti-razvitiya-sotrudnichestva