ABSTRACT

The museum, as a state institution, subjected to the dominant ideology, dictates the official form of art and culture. The Central European postcolonial museum as an official cultural institution was affected in a twofold manner: the Eastern European situation and the war in former Yugoslavia provided a postcolonial repertoire for the Western museums and their exhibiting policy, and Eastern Europeans themselves became potential visitors either as tourists or as students and migrants. One of the popular museums that combine the consumerist expectation of a visitor with the attempt to re-formulate the dominant perception of history is the Vienna Museum. The popular museum was renovated through the life and destiny of Angelo Soliman, and postcolonial theory was institutionalised. The modern museum evokes notions of democracy and democratisation, communicated through the intensification of educational and transmission processes. The principal relevance of modern and contemporary art production is theorised as a tradition of resistance against the capitalist market.