Museums in Nghe An need innovation and community engagement

Preserving cultural and historical values

Currently, the province has two provincial museums: Nghe An Museum and Nghe Tinh Soviet Museum. Both museums are located on Dao Tan Street, Cua Nam Ward (Vinh City), right in the Vinh Citadel area, with convenient transportation and many nearby attractions.

In particular, the Nghe Tinh Soviet Museum was established in 1960 with the mission of researching, collecting, preserving, displaying, educating, and promoting the value of the Nghe Tinh Soviet heritage, and was officially inaugurated in September 1963. This is one of the three earliest museums established in the Vietnamese revolutionary museum system; it is a place to preserve and display 17,000 documents and artifacts about the Nghe Tinh Soviet movement.

Staff of the Nghe Tinh Soviet Museum introduce images and documents about historical figures in the Nghe Tinh Soviet Movement. Photo: Minh Quan

Nghe An Museum was established in 1979, with the mission of researching, collecting, preserving, displaying, educating, and promoting the value of tangible and intangible cultural heritage of Nghe An province. With more than 31,300 typical documents and artifacts of historical and cultural value, dozens of rare collections of artifacts, and 3 National Treasures recognized by the state (including a dagger with a handle shaped like a snake holding an elephant's leg, a bronze ladle with an elephant-shaped handle, and a box containing Nhan Tower relics), along with its scale, area, storage warehouse, exhibition house, 600m2 service area, and auxiliary works, Nghe An Museum has become one of the top provincial museums in the North Central region.

Students visit Nghe An Museum. Photo: Minh Quan.

Both the Nghe Tinh Soviet Museum and the Nghe An Museum are places that preserve cultural and historical values, conveying to all people an understanding of their origins, historical journeys, and unique cultural features, thereby contributing to creating community solidarity and creating a foundation of patriotism among the masses.

On the other hand, in the province's tourism development, museums are also considered as connecting points to other historical and cultural tourist areas and destinations. In 2021, both museums were recognized as tourist destinations of the province.

To increase the connection between museums and the community, in addition to serving on-site visitors, museums also organize thematic exhibitions; mobile exhibitions inside and outside the province; organize cultural exchanges and traditional talks.

In addition, the coordination with the Department of Education and Training to welcome students from schools to visit and learn has also been carried out quite effectively by the museums. In addition to explaining to help students understand each specific artifact, the museums also organize many experiential activities such as the Golden Bell contest to introduce the Nghe Tinh Soviet heritage at the Nghe Tinh Soviet Museum, the activities "Happy Spring Festival", "Betel and Phoenix Wings", "Flowers from the Earth", "Uncle Ho in My Heart"... at the Nghe An Museum...

Ms. Nguyen Thi Hong in Quang Trung Ward (Vinh City), mother of Vo Nhat Linh - a student at Quang Trung Primary School, said that her family has lived in Vinh City for many years but had never been to a museum before. Last year, her daughter was organized by the school to study and experience at Nghe An Museum, she was very excited and enthusiastic. Since then, whenever she has time, her family takes her here to visit to better understand the history and culture of their locality.

There is a need for innovation.

However, in reality, the connection between museums and the community is still not strong. Both the Soviet Nghe Tinh Museum and the Nghe An Museum have not really become destinations for locals and tourists, as the number of on-site visitors to the museums has not met expectations.

For example, in 2023, according to museum reports, the Nghe Tinh Soviet Museum welcomed about 11,000 on-site visitors, while the Nghe An Museum welcomed 9,000 on-site visitors. However, most of these visitors were from research groups and students from schools coming to study extracurricular activities, while there were not many tourists.

Children experience performing Vi and Giam folk songs at Nghe An Museum. Photo: Minh Quan

Through discussion, the leaders of the two museums said: Although many new methods have been applied to attract visitors to the museum, including increasing communication on social networking sites, enhancing experiential activities, etc., there is still an important thing that the units have not been able to do, which is connecting with the tourism industry to promote the strengths of cultural and historical tourism.

According to Mr. Nguyen Trong Cuong - Director of Nghe An Museum: Coordinating with travel companies is not easy because most travel agencies often want to take tourists to tourist destinations with more entertainment, recreation and resort services than sightseeing and learning places like museums.

In addition, the museums themselves currently have limitations in their operations, leading to a lack of attraction for visitors. At the scientific workshop “From the outline of Vietnamese culture - strategic orientation for cultural development in Nghe An province to 2030” held at the end of December, when evaluating the activities of museums in the province, some experts said that although the museums have made efforts in organizing activities and innovating displays, they are still quite monotonous and have not surpassed the old model.

Museums have not yet invested in modern technological equipment to support the display content, making the display content more vivid and attractive such as audio equipment, LED screens, touch screens... so it causes a feeling of boredom and monotony when visiting the old display system without any interactive activities with documents and artifacts. Experiential activities for children are still quite limited. Other services for visitors such as resting, eating, shopping for souvenirs at the museum... are almost non-existent.

Nghe Tinh Soviet Museum organizes the Golden Bell contest to learn about the Nghe Tinh Soviet Movement. Photo: Minh Quan

Experts also believe that it is time to change the perception that museums are not simply places to preserve historical and cultural values ​​of the past, but need to become places to connect the past, present and future, associated with the development of society. Organizing activities at museums needs to be diverse, attractive, suitable for contemporary life, close to the community, with the goal of focusing on visitors, serving the community as the main thing, providing many types of services in the museum, serving a variety of subjects.

In particular, the exhibition activities are where there needs to be the most drastic change, because it is impossible to keep the old content and form of exhibition to serve visitors with different levels of awareness, the need to learn knowledge and skills to use more developed technology. Especially for young visitors, they want to participate, practice, and experience with the artifacts.

Therefore, museums in Nghe An need to actively apply modern science and technology such as: virtual reality technology, automatic explanations, 3D museums, touchless interaction (Leap Motion), 3D Mapping...; integrating interaction and experience in exhibitions to help the public explore, experience, interact with exhibitions and receive information about artifacts proactively and effectively.

In addition, it is necessary to create a policy mechanism to organize accompanying services and cultural activities, both to create an interesting experience for visitors and as a way to communicate and promote museums, while also helping these units have a source of revenue to support professional activities./.

Source: https://baonghean.vn/cac-bao-tang-o-nghe-an-can-co-su-doi-moi-gan-ket-voi-cong-dong-post282911.html