On Building Caring Relations
Museums have the potential to help societies navigate the painful legacies of colonialism in the present day. But how can museums become caring, socially engaged spaces that focus on people and that view collections as living cultures? How can they create new, more equitable relationships with their direct communities and the different communities that are intimately connected to their collections? How can museums co-produce and co-create knowledge and stories in ethical ways? Lives of Objects: Online Gathering #2 invites a community member from KwaZulu Natal, South Africa, along with Dr. Njabulo Chipangura, curator of Living Cultures at the Manchester Museum, and Motsane Seabela, curator of Anthropology at the Ditsong Cultural History Museum in Pretoria, South Africa, to reflect on the changing role of the museum. Moderated by Sherry Davis, the discussion will turn the lens on the idea of “living cultures”, told through a collection of Zulu beadwork and a British-South African collaboration.
BIOGRAPHIES
Dr. Njabulo Chipangura is the curator of Living Cultures at the Manchester Museum, which is part of the University of Manchester. Chipangura is responsible for the care and curation of over 25, 000 objects from Africa, Asia, the Americas, and Oceania as well as tasked with carrying out provenance research with the communities from which these objects were collected. He previously held a ten-year tenure with the National Museums and Monuments of Zimbabwe as a curator in the archaeology department.
Motsane Getrude Seabela is currently Curator of Anthropology at Ditsong Museums of South Africa. She received her Master of Social Sciences in Heritage and Museums Studies (cum laude) from the University of Pretoria and is currently pursuing a PhD in Heritage and Museums Studies from the same institution. Her research hinges between anthropology, heritage and museums studies and history. Seabela has keen interest in oral histories, provenance research, women histories, indigenous conservation perspective and has published on the muted voices and narratives in museums. She also has interest in exploring different archives by asking questions around inherited colonial histories and practices in museums. Her recent publication and co-curated exhibition deals with the preservation of museum collections as an inherited obsession and asks questions on how to confront and break away from such practices.
MaNtshangase is a community member from KwaNongoma in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa. She does not make beadwork herself but buys from the makers in Durban, then hires them out for different occasions, such as weddings. She is also very knowledgeable about the Zulu beadwork and their use.
Lives of Objects: Virtual Gatherings Curator
Sofia Lovegrove is a Portuguese-British independent researcher, curator, and heritage professional based in the Netherlands. Her research lies at the intersection of critical heritage and memory studies, with a focus on the colonial past, the role of representation in engendering narratives of belonging, and decolonial and reparative practices. She currently works at the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, where she focuses on the topics of multiperspectivity, slavery past,colonial heritage and international cooperation. She is an alumni of TheMuseumsLab 2022 and a founding member of the collective
Disrupting & Reorienting Restitution.
Lives of Objects: Virtual Gatherings Moderator
Sherry Davis is an award-winning musician, filmmaker and curator with a passion for utilising the arts to inspire social justice. Her 2022 multi-disciplinary arts project
Ode to the Ancestors, commemorates the Black contribution to conservation and archaeology in East Africa. An exhibition of photographic archives that celebrates Kenyan heritage professionals from in and around the colonial period is on display at the Horniman Museum and Gardens in the UK until 3rd December 2023, and is touring Kenya with the National Museums of Kenya.
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