{"id":37473,"date":"2020-04-10T13:24:10","date_gmt":"2020-04-10T11:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/icom.museum\/?page_id=37473"},"modified":"2023-03-23T16:02:59","modified_gmt":"2023-03-23T14:02:59","slug":"how-to-reach-your-public-remotely","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/icom.museum\/en\/covid-19\/resources\/how-to-reach-your-public-remotely\/","title":{"rendered":"How to reach your public remotely"},"content":{"rendered":"

The ongoing outbreak of COVID-19 is causing widespread anxiety and quarantine measures in different countries around the World. People are staying home to limit the spread of the illness, and venues that normally draw large crowds, including museums, have shut their doors.<\/h3>\n

Although this forced isolation limits the opportunities for museums to reach their audiences, several institutions around the world are showing great creativity and resilience by harnessing the power of social media. We prepared a list of case studies and best practices in digital outreach that can inspire museums to deal with this situation.\u00a0Here’s what you can do to reach \u2013 and engage \u2013 your public remotely:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Put your collection online<\/strong><\/h2>\n

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For several years now, museums have been sharing their collections online. The digitalisation of artworks represents a great opportunity for heritage promotion, to extend fruition and your relationship with visitors beyond the museum and, ultimately, to encourage co-creation processes with the public!<\/p>\n

Recently, The Smithsonian released 2.8 Million high-resolution images from across its collections<\/strong> onto an open access online platform<\/a>, and earlier this year Paris city museums offered 100,000 (now up to more than 300,000) digital reproductions of artworks as Open Access via their Collections portal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Open Access is a powerful tool to empower your audiences and give them tools to remix, repurpose and reimagine the treasures you hold!<\/p>\n

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\u00a9 Jon Scieszka and Steven Weinberg<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The COVID-19 health crisis is pushing more and more institutions to dematerialize their collections: Chinese heritage sites including the Chongqing China Three Gorges Museum, the Chongqing Natural History Museum and the National Museum in Beijing have all opted to increase their digital offerings. About 100 online exhibits can be accessed from anywhere via China\u2019s National Cultural Heritage Administration website<\/a> (in Chinese).<\/p>\n

Organise virtual tours
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Facebook\/Instagram Live<\/strong>
\nMany museums regularly offer livestreaming tours of their collections and exhibitions, often hosted by curators or museum directors themselves (check out this walkthrough of the exhibition “City and Cosmos: The Arts of Teotihuacan” at the LACMA<\/a>). This represents an amazing tool to increase engagement with behind-the-scenes looks and to reach a broader public. Did you know that during our last General Conference, on top of participants from 114 countries, people from other 16<\/a> followed #ICOMKyoto2019 via Facebook Live and live Tweet?<\/p>\n

On 14 August 2017, in a world-first Facebook live broadcast, Vincent van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ paintings were united virtually in a unique collaboration led by art experts from the National Gallery, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, Neue Pinakothek in Munich, Philadelphia Museum of Art and Seiji Togo Memorial Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Museum of Art.<\/p>\n