Week 10 Further Investigation of Public Programs

Through my pre-class reading, Building a User-Generated Museum: A Conversation with Alistair Hudson, I further refined the theoretical foundation of my exhibition. My exhibition is intended to serve oppressed groups—residents of peripheral communities, sexual minorities, people with disabilities, and ethnic minorities—rather than the art market controlled by a select few[1]. I will reallocate power and direct funds toward artists and communities in peripheral regions[2]. The products I design and sell are not intended to serve the cultural capital of the art market; instead, I will discuss with the artists who provide the patterns how to donate the funds earned from these products to peripheral regions. Since sources of income have a variety of impacts, including strengthening public programs, I have chosen to sell these products so that the profits can be used to expand future public programs. My exhibition is not merely a single event, but rather a tool for an ongoing strategy that incorporates various public programs[3]. Naturally, this expansion might involve broadening the scope of the online accessibility platform, such as creating a website for fundraising and promotion.

My exhibition should not be targeted at a single group of collectors[4]. Consequently, the artworks I have selected are printed copies of digital works, including design drafts and 3D model renderings provided by artists who have recently graduated from the ECA. These works explore narratives surrounding peripheral communities, with the aim of engaging with these areas and offering solutions—rather than entering the art market to become mere decorative items in collectors’ homes.

[1] Alistair Hudson, Building a User-Generated Museum: A Conversation with Alistair Hudson, openDemocracy, 5 May 2017, https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/building-user-generated-museum-conversation-with-alistair-hudson/ (accessed 30 March 2026).

So I’ve been interested in that trajectory within the history of art, which is not the one we’re told – which has been defined by the market and by capital – and we should instead reclaim art as a much more all-encompassing, ordinary activity for everybody, rather than something for the elites or the 1% or for those that have, as opposed to those that don’t.

[2] Alistair Hudson, Building a User-Generated Museum.

So the ambition – and this is why I talk about ‘usership’ and the useful museum – is that you create an institution that is created by and through its usership, so that the content and the function is increasingly less determined by those in power, but rather you redistribute authorship, you redistribute power, to make the institution the true manifestation of its community.

[3] Alistair Hudson, Building a User-Generated Museum.

throughout the show we developed a programme of what we call ‘community days’ where everybody came together to the museum, to reinforce their status and identity on equal terms. Always the ambition was that this would not be a singular exhibition but a tool in developing this as a continual strategy as we went along. So every Thursday we have a community day for these groups: a free lunch, a whole day of activities, these groups are developing our garden as a community garden, and we’re running English classes, craft and design and technology workshops.

[4] Alistair Hudson, Building a User-Generated Museum.

And with the idea that we should not tell the story as singular curators, but we should open up the narrative to the communities around us – so we basically did an open call and in effect crowd-sourced the exhibition. It was this mayhem of artworks suggested and contributed by people, artists, non-artists and archives from the environment around us.