How to ‘Enlighten’ museum visitors: Curating Derby Museum’s Enlightenment Exhibition

Curating museum exhibitions effectively to engage visitors with historical objects is challenging, especially when balancing the need for informative interpretation without overwhelming or boring audiences. The 'Enlightenment' exhibition at Derby Museums (2013) tackled this by displaying 18th-century objects—such as trade-related items and natural history artifacts—in a way that highlighted their significance while maintaining visitor interest. Funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, the project involved three institutions (Derby Museums, Buxton Museum, and Strutt’s North Mill) to enrich collections and contextualize Derbyshire's Enlightenment period within the UNESCO-listed Derwent Valley Mills site. The exhibition aimed to link objects like a polar bear plate to themes of trade, fashion, and natural history, demonstrating how strategic curation can bridge academic depth and public engagement.

Dunning, L. (2013). How to ‘Enlighten’ museum visitors: Curating Derby Museum’s Enlightenment Exhibition. Scene, 1(3), 429–442. https://doi.org/10.1386/scene.1.3.429_1