Co-founder and Curator.
Smástundarsafnið or The Pop Up Museum (PUM) is a participatory museum established early spring 2012 by Edda Björnsdóttir, Jóhanna Björk Sveinbjörnsdóttir and Karina Hanney Marrero. Since it’s establishment PUM has been commissioned to host multiple events inside and outside of Reykjavík, Iceland. The PUM and has been well received by the public and culture sector alike. The general interest for the PUM’s events has resulted in an interview at Rás 1 the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service, features in local newspapers Fréttablaðið and Morgunblaðið and invitations to take part in the Museum Night at Reykjavík’s Winter Lights Festival and the Icelandic Museum Day in 2013. In the past the PUM has received funding from: ICOM – The International Council of Museums, The University of Iceland, The Museum of Design and Applied Art and Reykjavík City Museum.
Conceptual framework:
Using Nina Simone’s Museum’s 2.0 ‘Radical Simple Formula for Pop Up Museums‘ as a template we adapted the guidelines to what we thought to be a simple and interesting approach to museum practice. The PUM is a participatory museum where guests are provided the chance to share and register memories and stories related to personal, private objects. By approaching the guests as memory vessels, we hope to enable these domestic objects to be represented though interesting, personal accounts. The temporary one-day-only PUM events rely solely on the participation of its guests for it’s material, we therefor ask our guests to register their stories for our online collection. The PUM differs from traditional museum practice in two main ways; it’s events and collection relies solely on the contributions of its guests not visa versa. Without our guests there is no event, and without the event we have not stories to acquire. But most importantly, the PUM seeks to challenge which and how objects are presented in museums, as we believe all objects have a story to tell. This approach challenges the imposed historical, socio-political, epistemological customs of museum practice in an interesting way.
At the PUM; gloves, a pregnancy test, skiing goggles, an engagement ring, a beach ball or a dried leaf become the main characters. Through the participatory museum material culture becomes a catalyst for interpersonal exchange. The PUM highlights the personally significant micro stories behind each object.
Look, look in front of you. Yeah, there just a little further on the right, on the table. What’s that? How did you get it? Where is it from? Why do you love it?
For event updates visit our Facebook page.
For enquiries and questions send us an email at smastundarsafnid(at)gmail(dot)com.
karina hanney marrero 