Connecting Collecting - Sveriges Museer

The Pool for Management of Natural ResourcesNature– an exploited heritageWhat do living conditions in a village in northern Sweden have in common with silos under threatof demolition in Västergötland? What links cultural tourism with the move of a whole town? Thecommon denominator is how people use the resources provided by nature, the very preconditionsfor our survival – and the field studied by the Pool for Management of Natural Resources.By Ann-Katrin Wahss and Eva Gradin»The pool investigates and documentsthe use of nature in Sweden– land, forest, water, and minerals. Thework of the pool is closely connected tothe times and the political decisions thataffect us all. The Samdok studies illuminatehow these decisions affect peopleand the landscape and are importantboth for posterity and in contemporarysociety. This article gives some examplesof projects that have been conducted inrecent years.The consequences of our electricityneedsGallejaur is a village in the forest on theboundary between the counties of Norrbottenand Västerbotten. Here NorrbottenMuseum was commissioned by theCounty Administration in Norrbottento carry out an ethnological interviewstudy and photographic documentationduring an annual cycle, 2000–2001. Gallejaur,which in many contexts is describedas a forest village that is unique tonorthern Sweden, has been radically hitby the effects of our industrial society.The conditions for the village’s livelihooddisappeared with the construction ofthe Gallejaur power station in 1960–64.Almost all arable land and cultivated bogwas placed under water, when the lakeGallejaursjön was transformed into aregulating barrage. The shoreline camealmost 100 metres closer to the villagesettlement. Today only three farms areoccupied in the winter, but during thesummer the village comes to life, whenrelatives return to the farms that are nowholiday homes.The study focused on how the villagehas been shaped as a local culturalenvironmentsystem and was carried outto provide information for an inquiryinto the possibility of forming a culturereserve.People and their buildings was thetopic chosen in order to shed light onthe village’s development and change. Tofind causal connections between the village’sorigin, development, and presentappearance, the project involved notonly interviews with villagers but alsostudies at the Environmental Court inUmeå and the Land Survey Authority inLuleå. The study describes the developmentfrom a new settlement, marked outin 1801, to a village whose existence hasbeen radically affected by the needs forelectricity in the industrial society. Theassignment has been presented in a publicationand a travelling exhibition.At the County Administration negotiationsare now in progress with theproperty owners about compensationfor trespass, and the hope there is that adecision to make Gallejaur a culture reservecan be made during 2008.Moving a townNorrbotten Museum is also involvedin following the move of large partsof the town of Kiruna. In the comingdecade, much of the town centre has toSilo in Vara. Photo Thomas Carlquist©Västergötland Museum.be moved because a large body of ironore is to be extracted, with the risk ofundermining the buildings and causingcollapses. Here the use of natureis dramatically confronted with humanliving environments. In preparationfor the inevitable transformation ofthe town, the museum is performing asurvey and analysis during 2007 of theevaluations that different local, regional,and national actors make of the town asa cultural environment. The study willprovide a foundation for decisions thathave to be made about Kiruna’s futureurban environment.How will the move take place? Whatdo people think when they move? Whatis given priority? The pool is discussingthe possibility of holding a field seminarin Kiruna once the moving process hasgot started.The agrarian memorialsof modernismWhat happens to the buildings thatare no longer needed for agriculture?14 • Samtid & museer no 2/07