Introduction

In this part of the book, we turn to the different strategies and forms through which museums might utilise objects to make representations and to tell stories. It follows on logically from the second part: for although it continues to explore and problematise the role of objects within exhibitionary settings, the previous emphasis on how visitors experience and respond to objects as material things is now complemented with a focus on the different strategies and forms through which museums do, or could, use objects to make representations and tell stories. The diversity of subjects represented in the following chapters – contemporary art museums, historical costume, collector-donors, missing and absent objects, and ‘relics’ of Arctic expeditions – reflect not only a range of museum representations generally, but also the breadth of Susan Pearce's interests and some of the spheres in which her writing and teaching has been influential.