The meeting was organized by the Department of Pedagogy and Psychology, Institute for Theoretical Studies at the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest (MOME) and it was divided into two different parts: on the first day there was a demonstration of workshop activities in the Ludwig Museum and on the second day a conference was held at the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest (MOME) (see the seminar’s program). The first day was exclusively addressed to ITEMS members and the second day was opened for the public too.

The first day started with the visit of the Place of Arts building. It was followed by the greetings of László Hemrik, head of the Museum Education Department and the presentation entitled ‘The Ludwig Museum and the museum’s educational projects’ by Nikoletta Koruhely. The presentation showed the multiple activities of the museum such as working with school groups, elderly people and opportunities of socially handicapped students from the countryside (the Raiffeissen bus) and so on. There were many questions on methodology, goals and results of the projects. Nikoletta Koruhely held a ‘Hyperreal session’ with the participation of the ITEMS members as students. Both of the activities included discussions.

After everything, a guided tour was offered in the ‘Yona Friedman’s Architecture without building’ exhibition.

In the evening the group participated in an exhibition opening (Péter Trembeczki: ‘Recalculating’, curator: Judit Gellér) at Faur Zsófi Gallery. The exhibition was part of a bigger project called Over-view in which artists present their works in galleries in close collaboration with their curators.

On the second day there was a conference with five presenters and started with the opening words of Anikó Illés at Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest.

The first presenter was Ágnes Szabics representing Műcsarnok (Kunsthalle Budapest). She spoke about their activities in general and especially about the ARTools Project, an irregular event which was aimed at schools and it was thematically specified.

The next two presenters were representing King Saint Stephen Museum and their presentations were entitled ‘From the Antiquity for the contemporaries’ and ‘School programs in the collections of the museum in Székesfehérvár’. Beáta Barna spoke about the activities in the antique collection and then Ágnes Eperjesi spoke about the educational programs of contemporary art collection and exhibitions.

At the second part of the conference Anna Ildikó Pető was the moderator. Zsófia Ruttkay presented a lecture about the diverse utilities of IT tools in the museum environment. She shared her views on the new technological inventions and presented one of her school project’s called the MOME Creative Technology Lab, which researches using new technologies in school and museum education.

Kinga German talked about her experiences in the Hungarian museum communication practices. She was studying and working in Germany so she could apply the outsider and the local point of views simultaneously.

In the afternoon, the ITEMS participants and few of the invited lecturers had a roundtable discussion on school and museum cooperation. The roundtable was chaired by Henri de Rohan-Csermák, Inspector General for Arts History at the Ministry of Education, Member of the High Council for Arts and Cultural Education (France). He summarized the two days and initiated important topics for discussion.

Later on ITEMS partners discussed the following issues:

1. Schedule of next meetings: the partners confirmed that the next four meetings will take place in Lisbon (20th-22nd of February 2012), Luxembourg (21st-23rd of March 2012) and Paris (25th-27th of May 2012): Marta Ornelas mentioned that she already sent the preliminary program on the Portuguese meeting and Paul Di Felice had some words on the program in Luxembourg;

2. Irene Baldriga offered some thoughts on maintaining the ITEMS project; she emphasized the importance of the pedagogical aspects of museum activities, especially the didactic goals of the workshops.

3. Stefano Mastandrea, as an expert of empirical psychology, suggested the method of measuring the different kinds of museum activities. The offer was successful and was discussed in details. The editing of the questionnaire and the proper way of carrying it out is an urgent task. Stefano Mastandrea will prepare the first draft.

4. The partners agreed to participate in the assessment issue with active contribution, and will discuss the final output of the project and a possible continuation for the partnership activities during the next meetings.

Partners will keep in contact during the next months and will collaborate in organizing the ITEMS meeting in Portugal.

Further information can be found at http://itemsproject.wordpress.com/

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Text: Anikó Illés and Judit Gellér
Photos: Olga Kocsi
Edited by: Anna Ildikó Pető

Participants:

PROGRAM

10:00-11:10

Chair: Anikó Illés, associate professor, Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest

Presentation on museum and school activities by Ágnes Szabics, artist, representative for museum education, Műcsarnok/Kunsthalle Budapest

Presentation on museum and school activities by Ágnes Eperjesi, artist, Hungarian University of Fine Arts, and Beáta Barna, art educator, King Saint Stephen Museum, Székesfehérvár

11:10-11:30 Coffee break

11:30-12:30

Chair: Anna Ildikó Pető, media artist, Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest

Presentation on IT applications in museums by Zsófia Ruttkay, associate professor, Moholy- Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest

Presentation on German and Hungarian experiences on museum communications by Kinga German, assistant professor, Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest

12:30-13:20 Lunch

13:20- 14:50 Roundtable on museum and school cooperation

Chair: Henri de Rohan-Csermák, Inspector General for Arts History at the Ministry of Education, Member of the High Council for Arts and Cultural Education (France)

Poster (by Manja Lekić):

• implementation of multi-faceted art education projects,
• organisation of creative workshops at art exhibitions and museums,
• creation of study materials for art studies,
• drafting and organisation of further education courses and workshops for art teachers.

The meeting was organized by ANISA with the collaboration of ECCOM and it was structured into two different parts: the first one was an international training seminar addressed to art history teachers which took place at the Vatican Museums on the 11^th and 12^th of April with a large participation of Italian and foreign experts on the field of museum didactics and pedagogy. More than 100 learners participated to the conference. ITEMS partners were invited to present their experiences to the public with specific reference to the issue of teachers’ training and their relationship with museum services (see the seminar’s program).

Irene Baldriga (ANISA) and Cristina Da Milano (ECCOM) gave a presentation on the Leonardo da Vinci Program and, more specifically, on ITEMS project, explaining in detail the goals of our effort.

Thanks to a private technological sponsorship provided by ANISA, it was also possible to organize a workshop for teachers and museum educators within the space of the Vatican Picture Gallery. Learners were asked to fulfill a task by using a last generation tablet containing textual and visual resources elaborated by ANISA team about artworks of the Gallery and of the countries involved in the partnership. Working in groups, participants were able to get in contact with high tech devices and to apply them to the didactic purposes of their jobs. Furthermore, people from different fields (schools, museums, institutions) could share their experiences and could socialize through an informal pattern of collaboration. As a result, all the main strategies and goals of ITEMS project were applied in a theoretical and in a very practical approach as well. Pictures and documentations of the event were collected and will be used for the dissemination of the project.

The third day was dedicated to ITEMS partners. In the morning, we visited the Trajan’s Markets, where Dr. Ungaro (responsible for the archelogical area) and Dr. Del Moro (responsible for the didactic activities) illustrated the setting and the educational activities of the museum and how new technologies are used within the museum in order to facilitate cultural accessibility to a very complicated monument. Dr. Ungaro and Dr. Del Moro recently published a book on the connection of new technologies in the educational communication of the museum.


The group then moved to the MACRO (Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome) museum, where Dr. Maggiori (responsible for the educational activities) presented to us the educational activities of this quite recent contemporary art museum.

Materials, information and publications were distributed to the partners in order to encourage future contacts among the institutions involved.

In the afternoon, partners met at the Andersen Museum, where the following issues were discussed:

a)      Schedule of next meetings: the partners confirmed that the next two meetings will take place in Latvia (September 2011) and Hungary (November 2011), while the last one will take place in Paris in May 2012. Partners still need to set the dates of the meetings which will take place in Portugal and Luxembourg;

b)      Cristina Da Milano informed the partners that, with regard to the documents about the situation in each country referring to the relationship between schools and museums, we have now gathered those concerning Italy, Portugal and Luxembourg; we are still missing those from France and Hungary, while the one from Latvia will be presented during the meeting;

c)      Dr. Ineta Zelca-Simansone from the National Art Museum of Latvia presented a paper about the role of museum education in Latvia with specific reference to the relationship with schools. The presentation will be soon available on ITEMS website;

d)     Jean Miguel Pire underlines the need for the partners to start thinking concretely about the final product that we want to create as the main outcome of the ITEMS project and that we need to discuss this issues in details during our next meeting in Latvia;

e)      Anikò Illes confirmed that there is a blog available, where one can find the images/videos recorded during this meeting by her students: all partners are invited to collect materials/documents to be put on this blog using the e-mail address itemsproject.leonardo@gmail.com.

Partners will keep in touch during the next months and will collaborate to the organization of ITEMS meeting in Riga.
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Text: Cristina Da Milano
Photos: Judit Gellér, Anna Ildikó Pető
Edited by: Anna Ildikó Pető

Participants (directly involved in the partnership; other Italian learners from schools and museums are not listed here):