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Multiple Interpretations, Technological<br />

Applications and Public Interaction in<br />

Archaeological Museums in Europe<br />

nikolas PaPadiMitrioU, Museum of Cycladic Art<br />

The quest for efficient technological applications in museums has<br />

been intense over the past 15 years. Archaeological museums, in particular,<br />

have laid emphasis on techniques of virtual reconstruction,<br />

meant to “breathe life” into fragmentary artefacts and architectural<br />

ruins; other applications attempt to demonstrate the contextual links<br />

between artefacts and sites, in order to clarify the functional utility<br />

of both. Such approaches serve a positivist attitude towards the<br />

past and have made archaeological knowledge more accessible and<br />

comprehensible to the public. Whether they have fully responded<br />

to the needs of a modern audience, however, is a question which has<br />

to remain open.<br />

The ultimate goal of current museological research is interactivity.<br />

Quite often, however, “interactivity” in literature is meant in its strict<br />

technical sense, referring to various types of multimedia which communicate<br />

more effectively the messages of a given exhibition structure.<br />

Only rarely is this associated with a re-appraisal of curatorial<br />

practices and a reconsideration of conceptual attitudes towards the<br />

exhibits. 1 Yet, an interactivity which relies only on technical resources<br />

can offer little more than fresh packaging to old ideas. Innovative<br />

approaches are also necessary if we want to make a difference<br />

from the past. Information technology provides a new and attractive<br />

“language” of communication; but as with every type of communication,<br />

the message matters more than the medium.<br />

If we wish to find out how we will improve the experience of visitors<br />

in archaeological museums, we need first to understand what<br />

modern audiences expect from such type of institutions. This is not<br />

an easy exercise. Social and economic conditions have changed dramatically<br />

in Europe since archaeological museums were first established<br />

back in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and, also,<br />

since a new wave of interest in museums and the interpretation of the<br />

past arose in the last decades of the twentieth century. 2<br />

39

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