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Rubin Museum - future museum without walls
This article is written by guest contributor Jerry Johnston
The Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art has shut its doors to become a "museum without walls."
Its official closing was October 6, 2024. From then, the Rubin’s artifacts and exhibitions will live on by traveling (as its Mandala Lab has to Bilbao, London, and Milan), being loaned to museums (as its Tibetan Shrine will to the Brooklyn Museum), appearing in collaborations (like its support for the Nepal pavilion at the 2022 Venice Biennale)—or becoming part of the museum’s growing digital experience.
What’s the bigger picture?
Post-pandemic museum attendance in the US is declining (though these days digital engagement with the arts is up). The role of the museum is in flux. Realizing this, many institutions have begun rethinking their positioning, programming, and visitor experience to feel like "radically" welcoming, immersive destinations.
The Rubin has faced similar headwinds. But, after years of piloting new ways of reaching people through digital and distributed experiences, the museum now feels confident in taking a completely different path than its peers. Instead of focusing its resources to pull more of the world inside their museum, the Rubin is pushing their museum out into the world.
Closing its space to become a distributed, digital-enabled museum is a surprising departure from the norm, and a choice they’re making “from a position of strength,” said Jorrit Britschgi, the Rubin’s executive director, to serve “the public locally, nationally, and internationally.”
What does it look like?
To date, the Rubin has focused its digital efforts on recreating visitor favorites like its Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room, building interactive educational platforms like Project Himalayan Art, and exporting its mission through a pair of podcasts.
Mindfulness Meditation podcast connects listeners with prominent meditation teachers
AWAKEN podcast (Webby Honoree) about the path to enlightenment
What can we learn?
- This gives curious, ambitious museums permission to protect the “why” of their institution while experimenting with—or, in the Rubin’s case, drastically changing—the “how.”
- The Rubin isn’t designing its digital space to behave like its physical space—they aren’t pay-walling digital exhibitions and charging for admission. The Rubin is using digital as a place to connect and make sense of the larger, fundamental shifts it’s working through—finding more diverse ways to sustain itself and remaining culturally relevant by being in many places at once.
- The Rubin is a pioneer. Whether or not this evolution works out, it’s a case study in the making. If you’re a cultural institution, you should keep watch.