Marjolijn Dijkman and Jes Fernie

History Rising is a subversive and engaging study of museum display in East Anglia. Viewers and participants are invited to reconsider their view of history by looking at the mechanisms museums put in place to create a sense of order and hierarchy within their collections. Wysing is one of the collaborative partners, helping to deliver the public programme.

Symposium
Friday 1 November 2013
Cambridge-Wisbech, East Anglia
10.30am-7.45pm

Daylong event exploring the issues raised in History Rising, a region-wide programme of installations, commissions and talks on the theme of museum display. The day will involve walks, talks, museum visits (including one of Britain’s oldest public museums), an immersive lecture en route to Wisbech and display object cake consumption. Participants include artists, academics, curators and museum designers.

10.30am Meet at Aid & Abet in Cambridge for coffee and croissants.

Introduction to the day by Jes Fernie, curator and producer of History Rising

Introduction to the work of Aid & Abet by CJ Mahony; view space along with the work of artist Tom Dale
Address: Aid & Abet, Station Road, Cambridge, CB1 2TZ (next to Cambridge Train Station)

11.00am Coach from Aid & Abet Cambridge to Wisbech

Lecture en route by: Richard Irvine, Social Anthropology Dept, University of Cambridge, The Fens: a real time ethnographic, historic perspective.The lecture will be punctuated with music by Simon Scott from his recent album Below Sea Level – a fusion of environmental sounds and organic acoustic textures from The Fens in East Anglia

12.15pm Arrive at Wisbech & Fenland Museum

View On the Enclosures of Time, installation by Marjolijn Dijkman in the Hudson Room

1.00pm Walk to Peckover House, Georgian Townhouse for lunch; view house and garden

2.20pm Walk to Octavia Hill Museum for talks

2.30pm Jes Fernie, curator and producer of History Rising

Introduction to the afternoon and overview of issues raised in History Rising.

2.45pm Marjolijn Dijkman, artist, History Rising

Overview of recent projects and History Rising.

3.10pm David Wright, curator, Wisbech & Fenland Museum

Introduction to the town of Wisbech, the museum, its history and the display mechanisms employed over the past 160 years.

3.30pm Tea

3.50pm Calum Storrie, museum designer and author of The Delirious Museum: A Journey from the Louvre to Las Vegas

Proposal for the Quotidian Wing of the Delirious Museum. It’s been six years since the manifesto of the Delirious Museum was published in 2007. It’s time to make some improvements. Calum will present a strategy for the new Quotidian Wing, reinvigorating and updating the display structures and assembling new exhibits.

4.30pm James Beckett, artist, born in Zimbabwe, lives in the Netherlands, currently in residence at Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridgeshire

Just because something is in the past, it doesn’t mean it’s fixed. Through the scurrilous rearrangement and amalgamation of various museum display structures and objects, James Beckett encourages viewers to take a more flexible view of history.

5.00pm Discussion

5.20pm Walk back to Wisbech & Fenland Museum for launch

5.30pm Launch of On the Enclosures of Time, Wisbech Museum

Light supper, drinks and display object cake

6.30pm Coach leaves Wisbech for Cambridge

7.45pm Arrive Cambridge train station

Ticket price of £15 includes transport, lunch and museum entry. Book tickets on www.historyrising.org

This event has been organised in collaboration with Wysing Arts Centre, Aid & Abet and the Wisbech & Fenland Museum.

History Rising is a study of museum display across East Anglia by Marjolijn Dijkman, curated and produced by Jes Fernie.

The four-month programme is made up of a wide-ranging series of installations, events and commissions in Norwich, Wisbech, Dereham and Cambridge, organised in partnership with Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery, OUTPOST, Wisbech & Fenland Museum, Wysing Arts Centre, Aid & Abet and Denny Farmland Museum.