[Feature: University Museums] Roundtable Discussion: University Museums Challenging New Possibilities

This April, Keio Museum Commons (abbreviated as KeMCo) will open to the public as the first museum of Keio University. On this occasion, I would like to hear your thoughts on the role of university museums and, more broadly, how universities should engage with cultural properties.

At Keio, the concept of a museum has been considered several times in the past, but for various reasons, it never came to fruition. However, this time, it has been realized thanks to a donation from the Century Cultural Foundation.

In fact, Keio already houses various cultural properties across multiple campuses, some of which are casually displayed in various locations. Therefore, in creating the museum, rather than gathering these cultural properties in one place for storage and display, we conceived of a mechanism that views the entire Keio University as a single distributed museum, with KeMCo acting as a hub. To that end, we equipped it not only with storage and exhibition floors but also a creation studio, and put effort into enhancing the digital environment.

The keyword for KeMCo is "vacant lot." While it houses and permanently exhibits the Century Akao Collection, we view it as a "commons" that emphasizes creating interaction through cultural properties. We operate both the storage and exhibition rooms fluidly, constructing new contexts for cultural properties, utilizing them as educational content, and fostering interaction not only with university students but also with students from affiliated schools. Furthermore, the concept is to promote interaction with local and international communities.

First, I would like to ask for a few words on the meaning of a university having a museum, while you introduce your recent activities by way of self-introduction. Mr. Namiki, would you like to start?

Kyoto Institute of Technology has two predecessor schools. One is the Kyoto Sericultural Training Institute, established in 1899 to support Kyoto's textile industry, and the other is the Kyoto Higher School of Arts and Crafts, established in 1902. These two merged in 1949 to become Kyoto Institute of Technology. It is a school formed by the union of the so-called arts and crafts sector—specifically the crafts sector, which is a traditional industry of Kyoto—and the textile sector.

The Museum and Archives was established in 1980 based on the collections of these two predecessors. Until then, all stored materials were under the management of the university library. However, since the opening of the Kyoto Higher School of Arts and Crafts, there were many arts and crafts items such as Art Nouveau crafts and posters used as teaching materials, and there seems to have been a movement from quite early on to preserve them in an independent facility.

The core of the collection at the Museum and Archives consists of items purchased as teaching materials to show students for the purpose of modernizing Kyoto's traditional industries, basically from the late 19th to the early 20th century. However, since it includes posters by Lautrec and Mucha, we exhibit and open them to the public as arts and crafts—so-called cultural properties.

Basically, we protect, store, and exhibit the collection held since the school's opening. However, currently in the city of Kyoto, traditional industry businesses that can no longer hold onto valuable old items, such as Yuzen designs, often come to us for advice on what to do, and we frequently receive donations.

Therefore, there are almost no actual purchases. We cannot accept all donations, but regarding parts related to the modernization of Kyoto's traditional industries, we want to store, research, and exhibit them at our university as much as possible.

Also, in Kyoto, we have established the Kyoto Alliance of University Museums since 2011, and we are active as the presiding school. Currently, 14 museums from 14 universities in Kyoto belong to it, and since 2012, we have held joint exhibitions in Kyoto City as well as in Kyushu and Tohoku.

University museums have various roles, but our university accumulates teaching materials purchased for education and research since its opening, or works by our students, as the history of the university, and exhibits them not only as the history of the university but as the history of modern Kyoto. I believe that is one mission of our Museum and Archives.

Next, Ms. Okamuro, please.

The Tsubouchi Memorial Theatre Museum at Waseda University (Enpaku) was founded by Tsubouchi Shoyo in 1928 and celebrated its 90th anniversary in 2018. The former director, Bunzo Torigoe, who carried out a major reform of the Theatre Museum, left a famous quote: "If the library is the brain of Waseda University, the Theatre Museum is the face of Waseda University." We operate with that kind of pride.

Our museum was started by Tsubouchi Shoyo with the philosophy of "collecting theatrical materials from all times and places," and it truly collects theatrical materials from all over the world. A facility of this form is probably unique in Asia and one of the few in the world. It has a very large number of items, with a wide variety of over one million pieces in the collection. Furthermore, the building itself is designated as a Tangible Cultural Property of Shinjuku Ward.

Unlike artworks, theatrical and film materials include things that would normally be thrown away. In addition to flyers and tickets, paper media include Kabuki ledgers, Joruri books, old books, books, magazines, scripts, screenplays, handwritten manuscripts, drafts, flyers, posters, photographs, letters, diaries, telegrams, public relations magazines, clippings, memos, and so on. Regarding performances, there are costumes, shoes, accessories, props, masks, models, and blueprints. For video and audio, there are SP and LP records, cassette tapes, VHS, 8mm, CDs, and even dolls and dressing tables.

Also, the collection of actor prints (yakusha-e) is world-class; for example, we have materials of cultural property grade such as the "Onna Kabuki-zu Byobu" (Screen Painting of Women's Kabuki). We also have costumes of Fubuki Koshiji and various costumes for Kabuki, Noh, and more.

We also collect film materials. Since they were not destroyed in air raids, we have films of works that the National Film Archive in Kyobashi does not have, such as the 1916 film "The Kaminarimon Fire: The Blood-Stained Standard" (starring Matsunosuke Onoe).

The Theatre Museum used to be a place with a very high threshold for students. When I became the director in 2013, I thought it was strange that students didn't come even though it was at the university, and I wanted to get many students to come as a university museum. Then, I aimed for the museum to be not just an educational and cultural facility but a place for communication, and thought about promoting it internally and externally as the cultural face of the university.

Until then, the Theatre Museum had no interest at all in attracting visitors. The thinking was that it was enough to hold exhibitions that satisfied experts, so I thought this had to change and tried various innovations. One was strengthening the visual aspect, putting effort into spatial design. And we set up an experience corner as a participatory exhibition.

Also, there was no public relations officer until I became the director, so I created a PR position and promoted the museum widely through SNS and online news to appeal the fact that we hold a very wide range of exhibitions.

Last year, thinking about what could be done during the COVID-19 pandemic, we held an online exhibition titled "Lost Performances: Records and Memories of the Pandemic and Theatre," which received a great response. During the pandemic, many theatrical performances were forced to be cancelled or postponed, leaving a gaping hole in theatrical history. Thinking that we must not let it be as if it never happened, we collected various materials such as flyers, posters, and scripts that were no longer used and held an online exhibition.

Regarding the meaning of a university having a museum, when I think about how to get students to have imagination for others in today's society that emphasizes economy and efficiency, I believe that the existence of museums or exposure to theatrical culture is very important. The Theatre Museum links the fields of research and practice, and while staying close to practice, we strive to lead it to research results.

Now, Mr. Hosaka, please.

I started working as the director of the Museum of Modern Art, Shiga (Shiga Museum of Art from April) this January. Before that, I worked at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo for 20 years, where I held various exhibitions and was involved in collecting items for the collection. So, professionally, I have had no involvement with university museums at all.

The exhibitions I have worked on so far cover various genres, and to be honest, I am at a loss when asked what my specialty is. Most recently, there is an exhibition of architect Kengo Kuma to be held at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo from June, but on the other hand, I have been involved for a long time in exhibitions of creative expression by people who are not art professionals, known as Art Brut.

Also, since I have consistently worked on exhibitions of modern and contemporary art, instead of having a specialty, I am always thinking about what curation is and what meaning places that hold exhibitions, such as museums, have. While working on exhibitions of various genres, I often rely on university museums when I need to go and do research.

For an architecture exhibition, I viewed the Togo Murano archives at Kyoto Institute of Technology, and I remember viewing the Beckett exhibition at the Theatre Museum when I was developing a plan for a contemporary art exhibition. In other words, I am involved as a user.

By the way, I feel that university museums in Japan and overseas are quite different. I think one major issue is where one learns curation. That overlaps with the fact that the Japanese curator certification has become a mere formality, but I think university museums could function more as places to learn curation, not just museology.

In university museums in other countries, there are cases where they have their own graduate students participate in a kind of competition and let the winner actually hold that exhibition. I hope they function as places where curation can be learned practically in that way.

Another thing, from the perspective of Art Brut, is that Art Brut is still not fully evaluated even in art museums. And in the United States, there are many cases where private collections of Art Brut are donated to university museums.

As a result, exhibitions are naturally planned, and through that, students can come into contact with very vivid curation and research activities, such as what art is and how to contextualize and interpret things that have not yet been evaluated in so-called art history. I think that serves as a foundation and is able to stimulate museums outside of universities.

I believe that such a way of being is what will be required of Japanese university museums in the future.

Now, Mr. Watanabe, who is also the creator of the "Museum Commons" idea for KeMCo, please.

I moved to the university after working in museums for quite a long time. The first thing that surprised me when I moved to the Keio University Art Center (KUAC) was that there was no museum and no sign of creating one. Even at gatherings of university art professionals, when I said, "Keio doesn't have a museum," people were always surprised (laughs). Eventually, the Art Center obtained a very small exhibition room (Art Space), which has now become a museum-equivalent facility and contributes to the education for curator certification, but this Keio Museum Commons is the first attempt to create a proper museum.

However, this place also has physical constraints as a small space, and as it started somewhat in the gaps, I thought there might be something a university museum could do in a place different from the main line of Japanese museums.

If it was going to be small anyway, and since Keio is a latecomer, I thought we could have the idea of a distributed museum by collaborating with various departments within the university, so we decided to go with the name "Museum Commons" instead of just a museum.

It is not realistic for a latecomer university to have a large-scale museum, and I think the centralized way of gathering collections held by various departments into a single storage facility itself is not very 21st-century. So, I wondered if we could create a small but functional and light organization and mechanism that has the function of people coming and going with that place as a hub.

Therefore, we decided to make the overall concept a "vacant lot" and are devising ways to have the qualities of a vacant lot.

As for what a vacant lot actually is, having worked in completely different phases—a public museum like the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo and a private university—I feel that Japanese museums have progressed in a polarized way, being either fully public or private.

However, I feel that an alternative to that is becoming necessary. Talking with students, I have recently realized that it is a sensation shared even by the younger generation, but I wondered if we could create a place where everyone can share something or engage in creative activities under loose rules, rather than a membership-like idea—that is, strict rules. That is the idea of the "vacant lot."

In other words, it is about whether we can create a place that is creative while the members change according to the occasion, with rules that are somehow shared. Also, in a vacant lot without play equipment, everyone improvises and creates their own games, right? For example, if one tree is growing, they might use it for various purposes. In that way, I think it would be good if the KeMCo building itself is used in various ways.

I feel that the global situation for museums, especially public ones, is that the larger they are, the more they are becoming unable to move. If that is the case, I believe there is meaning in the mobility that university museums uniquely possess. Of course, if many people come, it leads to evaluation, but I don't think that is necessarily the primary objective, and I think the pressure to always seek publicness is not that intense.

As mentioned in Mr. Hosaka's talk, since university museums overseas are engaging in pioneering activities, I believe that university museums have the potential to do challenging things.

I very much sympathize with the mobility Mr. Watanabe just mentioned. Enpaku also aims to be an aggressive museum. Since it is very small as a museum, we always operate with an awareness of a guerrilla-like nature.

It has mobility in terms of size. If you try to do something new in a university department, it becomes a huge uproar, but at Enpaku, when someone comes up with something interesting, we can do it relatively quickly.

In the case of Enpaku or the Museum and Archives at Kyoto Institute of Technology, is it the case that there is no need to get approval for programs from the university side and you can decide independently?

Regarding Enpaku, there is no need to get approval from somewhere, and no regulations come from the university. So, we operate very freely.

In our case as well, we don't particularly consult the university; we discuss what kind of exhibitions to hold in the annual plan, but so far, no complaints have come from anywhere.

Subsidies from the Agency for Cultural Affairs are also applied for through the university, but what the Museum and Archives submits passes, so I don't feel we are under much restriction. Conversely, I think we are able to relatively freely do things unique to the Museum and Archives, such as partnering with other universities or other museums through museum alliances.

I see. Mr. Watanabe spoke earlier about fully public and private, but truly, the public side is stifling right now. This is a story that happened at a certain museum: when a curator tried to use the word "refugee" in an exhibition title, a complaint came in midway saying it was strange to make that a theme because the Japanese government maintains that it does not have a refugee problem.

While works of political criticism are always an issue even at the level of rental venues, if university museums are in a situation where it is easy to speak out while academic freedom and university autonomy are recognized, like the guerrilla-like nature Ms. Okamuro mentioned, I hope they make the most of that. I feel bad, as if I am entrusting you with things we cannot do ourselves.

When we held "Inside/Out: Video Culture and LGBTQ+" until recently, there were cautious views even internally. Since there are various ways of thinking even within the single term LGBTQ+, people said we might be scolded from somewhere, so we studied repeatedly within the museum and proceeded quite cautiously, but in the end, there was not a single criticism. I think this, too, might have been realized because it was a university museum.

That's right. When I first moved to Keio, I was surprised by how different it was from the number of OKs I had to get at my former workplace, the art museum. It is true that there was a tremendous sense of liberation in being able to say, "I want to do this," and having the director say, "Yes, go ahead."

That is indeed very important; there is mobility because the scale is small, and I think there is a certain kind of avant-gardism or academic freedom that university museums possess.

Unfortunately, I feel that so-called art museums have probably become more cramped than when I was there, and things that were relatively natural to do at an ordinary public art museum 20 years ago now require permission for every single thing.

We also submit the annual projects we do at the Art Center to the steering committee, but even if something not in the annual project is suddenly carried out, no one gets angry. I think having the mobility to do things as soon as you think of them is an important role of university museums.

In the future, while interacting with people from public museums, I think it would be interesting if a route of cooperation was created, such as saying, "If you can't do it at your museum, why not do it here?"

On the other hand, in the case of Enpaku, I myself do not have a curator certification and am a complete amateur regarding exhibitions. We currently have four curators, but in the past, amateur researchers often planned exhibitions, so there was a problem that they tended to lean too much toward specialization.

I certainly think that attracting visitors should not become the end in itself, but in order for the museum to become something open, I think we must also be conscious of having many guests come. That might be a specific issue for Enpaku, but we currently emphasize the balance between what we want to do and social needs.

The next topic is about the possibilities of digital. Over the past year, partly because we have been forced to take various measures due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I feel there are situations where simply expanding the exhibition environment digitally cannot attract the interest of visitors.

At KeMCo, by being the first museum to have a creation studio within the facility, we emphasize practicing the interaction between the physical and the digital by involving students. I would like to hear your thoughts on the possibilities or limitations of the digital environment, especially regarding initiatives during the pandemic.

I have seen KeMCo's wonderfully sophisticated virtual museum (Keio Exhibition RoomX: jinkan kosai (society)), but ours is diverse.

Enpaku puts a lot of effort into digital archives. We opened our digital archive collection in 2001 and have a 20-year history regarding digital archives. We have many accesses from overseas, starting with actor prints.

Among the things we have been putting effort into recently is the "Release of Noh Mask 3D Data." It has a very good reputation among people overseas as well, and taking the earthquake as a lesson, we are pursuing reproducibility by preserving precious materials as 3D data. Since it is digital data, you can flip it over on the screen, and the expression of a Noh mask changes depending on the angle. You can experience such things on a PC or smartphone.

Also, to commemorate the exhibition of Kawanabe Kyosai's "Shintomiza Yokai Hikimaku" (Ghost Curtain for the Shintomi-za Theatre) at the British Museum, we produced an animation based on high-definition images taken at Toppan Printing's studio. This received a great response at its unveiling in London.

The reason we created such a thing is that we are currently focusing on how to breathe new life into materials of classical performing arts using modern technology. We want to get students interested.

We are also putting effort into an "Automatic Kuzushiji Recognition System." We are developing this with the hope that not only overseas researchers but also students will become familiar with classical materials.

Furthermore, while we have been digitizing things that have physical originals, I think the challenge from now on will be how to handle born-digital materials.

I think digital data is one important element for becoming an open museum. In the past, museums competed based on how many precious physical objects they held, and while the fact that physical objects are very important remains unchanged, I think we are now being asked how to open them up by turning them into digital data.

There was just a mention of born-digital. How to secure and release content from that is a challenge, but audio and video data of someone speaking should have accumulated quite a bit.

At my previous post, the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, for example, there is audio data of Kaii Higashiyama speaking. However, to release it, we used to think about transcribing and editing it and putting it out in a paper medium such as a bulletin.

But now, having experienced the pandemic, setting aside the issue of rights processing, an atmosphere has emerged where it's okay to just put it out even if the sound is hard to hear.

In other words, until now, museums thought of objects as content, but I feel that even with the same archive materials, by regarding non-material things as content and releasing them, we will be able to attract people's attention.

In short, I think what museums will consider as content in the future is being questioned.

Another thing regarding born-digital: a constant problem in architecture exhibitions is the discussion of how to create exhibitions of architecture from the born-digital era onwards. I'm sorry for pushing things we can't do onto university museums, but since Kyoto Institute of Technology also has an architecture major, I hope you will pave the way for the possibilities of architecture exhibitions in the born-digital era.

That is a very important point. Currently, Mr. Matsuda and I are at a place called "KeMCo StudI/O," which corresponds to KeMCo's new Fab Lab, and one of KeMCo's concepts is the fusion of analog and digital. The studio exists as an extension of the vacant lot idea, based on the thought that a real "place" is actually necessary even for digital dissemination.

Attempts using various digital tools are being actively made in art exhibitions recently, but I feel that in many cases, even if they say "we will disseminate digitally," it is not very well connected to the exhibits.

Also, even if expert professors show cutting-edge digital technology saying "isn't it amazing," those of us who exhibit objects might not really understand what is so amazing. There is not much communication between the object side and the digital side.

I thought that Fab Lab-like things in universities also focus only on disseminating digitally, and the input side is not very well considered. The meaning of having a Fab Lab in KeMCo is that by having a site (place) that connects the digital to where there are objects called collections, we aim to be able to connect them and expand through the digital.

As Mr. Watanabe said, we created this studio because an analog place is necessary for the digital as well, but I would like to value the impact that objects have on the encounter with things expected of a museum.

As the next topic, I would like to think about how museums expand, starting from the impact that objects have. In the case of university museums, doesn't it start first from education and then expand to collaboration between universities, local communities, and further to international collaboration?

At KeMCo, we have started our own courses this year, and within them, Mr. Watanabe has started something called "Object-Based Learning" (OBL). Could you introduce it briefly?

Object-Based Learning (OBL) has not yet been widely integrated into university education in Japan, but it is a method that has been very actively adopted in Australia and the UK over the last decade or so as a way to incorporate "objects" into university education.

In a sense, it is a form of active learning, and it was originally a method often used in primary and secondary education. Simply put, the aim is to derive various educational effects by having pupils and students come into direct contact with objects. In recent years, it has also been frequently used in higher education and university education overseas. I want to make this the core of KeMCo's education.

In fact, in Japan, education that involves direct contact with works as objects has not taken place in elementary and junior high schools, but rather in workshops for children within museum education, and it is quite disconnected from school education.

To simplify OBL, it starts with how to describe a certain object. If there are ten students, they all say different things about the size of a cup, such as "about the size that fits in your hand," "the same size as a convenience store cup," or "about 10 centimeters high." It starts with experiencing how objects can be seen from so many different perspectives.

Museums basically deal with objects based on the logic of the side that shows them. Even in a university museum, the method is for the audience and students to experience them within a story created through curation. However, this is an educational system that starts from the object, creating opportunities for the viewer and learner to come into direct contact with the object instead.

Japan has strong peer pressure, and we tend to assume that everyone has the same background, but I think that just describing a single cup can be an opportunity to realize that people actually see things in completely different ways. By doing so, if students can gain the opportunity to liberate their thinking and feeling in more diverse ways, I think there will be interesting discoveries.

Also, on the side of providing omnibus classes, Mr. Matsuda is an expert in English literature, I am in art history, and another person, Hiroshi Shigeno from the Faculty of Science and Technology, is a digital expert, so it would be interesting if completely different perspectives open up for the students. At the same time, I think it would be interesting if it becomes a communication tool for the researchers who gather there and leads to cross-disciplinary research.

Is this something that has become a credit and been incorporated into the curriculum?

That's right. We have been doing trial classes since last autumn, and from this April, classes will be held in earnest for all faculties. It is planned to be a subject that students from any faculty can take for credit. It is not currently connected to the museum curator qualification subjects, though.

I see. In our case, separately from the museum practice course, as a project subsidized by the Agency for Cultural Affairs, students majoring in design use collection materials to create museum goods. This fiscal year, with the cooperation of Toyo Aluminium K.K., the assignment was to create museum goods using aluminum powder. For example, they might use aluminum powder to capture the luster of Tiffany glassware to create letter paper and envelopes.

In that way, we use the task of creating attractive goods by adding new insights based on actual collection items as a design assignment. This gives students a chance to learn what kind of materials are in the collection. It also leads them to think about how to utilize those expressions in other media, so it serves as a form of design education.

To begin with, our collection started as teaching materials, so students use them relatively often. They actually look at exhibitions and the students do sketches there.

The museum practice course is attended not only by design students but also by students from applied biology and mechanical engineering, and we teach them how to handle materials through the process of holding an exhibition. In April, we give the students a catalog of the collection and tell them to think of a theme they like; the trainees discuss it and narrow down the theme in the first half, and in the second half, they put together an exhibition while handling the works.

The students think about various things through the objects, and they don't just hold an exhibition, they also make posters. In this way, we try to utilize the collection materials for student education as much as possible.

Also, the topic of architecture came up earlier; when we hold an exhibition related to architecture once or twice a year, we have students create models from drawings. This serves as training for students to read drawings and also as training to actually build models. And by displaying them in a paid exhibition, it becomes an encouragement and they also take responsibility.

In this way, we utilize the materials of the Museum of Kyoto Institute of Technology within the practical experience of architectural design as much as possible. Since it is a small university, I want students to utilize the museum's materials in that way as much as possible.

Hearing your story, I thought I would definitely like to try producing museum goods at KeMCo as well.

At the Theatre Museum, there was a time when we did things like museum practice classes, but we aren't doing them now. Therefore, it is difficult to incorporate activities into education, but we are using various creative ways to get students to actually come to the museum.

Digitalization efforts are one of them, but today's students tend to think that nothing exists in this world except for things they are interested in. For example, there are areas where it is difficult to get them interested in historical things, so especially when exhibiting classical performing arts, we focus on how to make students realize that it is something related to themselves. For example, in exhibitions of classical performing arts, we strive to create points of connection with the present day.

If you create an entrance for them, students will indeed come, so I want to continue connecting the university and the museum in that way.

Mr. Hosaka, from your position outside the university, please share your thoughts on the connection with the community.

When I think about university museums, the one I think is most ideal is a museum in Germany called the Pinakothek der Moderne. It is a complex museum, a modern and contemporary art museum that includes a design museum, an architecture museum, and a picture gallery, but the architecture museum is operated by the Technical University of Munich.

The Technical University of Munich is quite old even within Europe and had architectural materials from around the 19th century and held a museum based on them, but when the Pinakothek der Moderne expanded its building, it moved in as part of it. It left the university campus. Moreover, they don't just display the collection there; they hold actual and challenging special exhibitions.

In short, for them, the method of researching and outputting architecture changed from writing papers to presenting in the form of exhibitions. In fact, the name of the university major has become "Architectural History + Curatorial Studies," and students are involved in the exhibitions held at the museum.

Furthermore, for example, in collaboration with Harvard's GSD—that is, the Graduate School of Design—they operate exhibitions using the flat network unique to universities. This might be an overly ideal case, and it might be slightly different from the connection with the community, but it is interesting as an example of the inter-university discussion.

In any case, I think it is also important to use the medium of exhibitions as a method of research output. In the coming era, there should be presentations that cannot be made without using audio language, video language, and everything else.

Moreover, since many people are more accustomed to complex experiences, such as listening to audio while watching video, rather than reading papers, shouldn't the world of the academy also move closer to that?

That story was very interesting, and I thought the fact that research and how to disseminate that research are inseparable is common to all fields.

The final topic is about how to give meaning to the collection, or what kind of mission is behind the collection building. I suspect everyone's position is different.

The Theatre Museum has the specificity of being a specialized theatre museum. We also have a research center called the Collaborative Research Center for Theatre and Film Arts, which is certified as a Joint Usage/Research Center by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, so research and the museum are very closely linked.

We are also putting effort into disseminating the research results of the research center at the museum, and the automatic transcription system for kuzushiji (cursive script) I introduced earlier is part of that. We do collect materials in a way that links with research.

For example, we have received a large amount of precious materials donated by the family of the playwright Minoru Betsuyaku, who passed away last year. So, we set up a research team at the Collaborative Research Center for Theatre and Film Arts, and we plan to hold a special exhibition starting this May as a result of that research, and we are also proceeding with the digitalization of the materials. We are conscious of collecting materials that connect these three points: the digital archive, the research center, and the museum.

However, this is a big problem, but we don't have enough storage. Since it was originally a small museum, we have been allowed to place materials in various places around the university, but everywhere is already full. So, even if we receive an offer for a donation of precious materials, we are in a situation where we first have to think about where to store them.

The problem of accepting materials and storage might be a common worry. How about you, Mr. Namiki?

Regarding the storage problem, it is exactly the same; we are in a situation where we are maneuvering in various places to secure space.

I am currently the Director of the Museum of Kyoto Institute of Technology, but for the past three years, I have also served as the Director of the University Library. Since it is a small university, we are actively initiating ML collaboration—collaboration between the Museum and the Library—within the university. To begin with, the materials in the Museum of Kyoto Institute of Technology were originally managed collectively by the University Library, and the museum was created by separating the art and craft materials from them, so there are actually quite precious design-related books in the library.

Therefore, in the form of a design archive, we are collaborating to link design-related books and the actual materials of the Museum of Kyoto Institute of Technology as organically as possible for exhibition, and we always display related materials from the library at the museum's exhibitions.

Furthermore, since we have set the modernization of Kyoto's traditional industries as a major theme for the core of the museum's collection and donated materials, we receive various things related to that, and in doing so, we try to team up with the alumni association.

In the alumni association, there are many people involved in Kyoto's traditional industries, such as Nishijin-ori weaving and Kiyomizu-yaki pottery, and we sometimes receive materials, but we are creating a kind of university history archive with the aim of excavating and organizing the university's history together.

Through this, we have clearly set a direction to clarify the modernization of Kyoto's traditional crafts from the aspects of materials, teaching materials, and objects, and have made it a pillar of the Museum of Kyoto Institute of Technology. We assemble exhibitions based on that as well.

Originally, the principals of this school in the Meiji era were scientists who researched synthetic dyes and chemical glazes, and the theme since the opening of the school has been the fusion of science and art. Regarding the materials in the museum's collection, we are considering whether we can create projects that link science and art, not just art, using the new perspective of how they were used in scientific terms.

Collaboration between the museum and the library is one of the things KeMCo wants to actively promote from now on. Mr. Hosaka, please speak from your public position.

My previous workplace, the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, had a kind of grand mission to create a collection that could trace the history of Japanese art since the modern era, and based on that, we searched for, selected, and collected works.

In the case of Shiga, we focus on collecting cultural properties within that area, and if you ask why we do that, one reason is so that the local people can have an attachment to or pride in their own region. We do this including unearthing things or adding new history.

For example, the reason Shiga is currently collecting Art Brut is because Shiga has a history of recognizing the value of those works ahead of other prefectures.

Based on those examples of the country and prefectures, when I think about what kind of policy could exist for a university museum's collection building, the story of Kyoto Institute of Technology just now is very helpful. Simply having materials concerning the modernization of Kyoto's traditional industries could be said to be within the scope of a national or public museum, but you said you are doing projects that link science and art based on that. In other words, it means that disciplines connect with each other using materials as a pivot, and as a result, scholarship is opened up.

This is something that is difficult to do in national or public museums, and if we stand on this premise, I think the way KeMCo is trying to think of the collections within the university as a "commons" will truly shine.

Utilizing materials as a commons is quite a significant thing. Museums research, interpret, and exhibit the materials they have, and as a result, the value of those materials increases in various ways. When that happens, inevitably, because they are precious materials, people don't want to let them out much or let others use them.

In the case of art museums among museums, that bias is strongly applied, but if the philosophy of thinking about various materials including artworks flatly and treating them as a commons can be established, I think it will be very suggestive for future museums.

Earlier, Ms. Okamuro said that the interests of young people are changing, and indeed, young people do not view art as something special and perceive things flatly. If museums face such changes in reality sincerely, I think what KeMCo is doing has a lot of potential.

Mr. Watanabe, what about KeMCo's collection building from now on?

I am very grateful for the expectations, but while Keio is said to be the oldest university in Japan, it didn't have a museum until now. When I think about what can be done when starting as the latest comer, conversely, I think there is freedom. Even if we receive the Century Akane Collection, there isn't a KeMCo collection policy as such.

Originally, I think a museum is a "storehouse." However, the school has been around for 160 years and hasn't built a storehouse, so if we are to build something now, rather than a storehouse, it would be effective if we could create a place like a vacant lot where various things can come and go. That is KeMCo's somewhat "relying on others" idea of collection building.

That is partly a desperate measure. There are cultural properties in small amounts in various places, and the departments or researchers who have them won't let go of them. So, even if a newly created museum says it will house them, it won't go well, and it will immediately get stuck with the storage problem. So, we shifted our thinking and started from the question of how such things can function more organically within the school. In that sense, there's no such thing as collection building.

Moreover, in the case of Keio, it is sometimes the affiliated schools that have the better items. So, while having opportunities for the students studying there to learn that "this painting is this kind of thing," by having the form of a commons rather than a so-called capital-M Museum, I hope we can achieve a loose, vacant-lot-like collection building.

The conversation has turned to the future, so finally, I would like to ask our seniors for a word of expectation or advice for KeMCo as a late-comer university museum.

As Mr. Watanabe said, there are things that can be done because it is a late-comer. Currently, our facility is 40 years old and becoming outdated, and we have no storage space, so I hope you will continue to send out messages so that we can see the "vacant lot" quality as a model.

When the talk of rebuilding the Museum of Kyoto Institute of Technology eventually comes up, I think we might be able to use it as a reference, and my expectations have grown today.

Ms. Okamuro from Waseda, which is in a position to be constantly compared as a fellow private school, what do you think?

I also thought the story of the vacant lot was very interesting. We are also conscious of having students come, but I realized today that involving students is still not enough. Therefore, I would like to watch with interest how the vacant lot functions in the future, and I hope you will continue to provide us with stimulation.

We have received various help from the Keio University Art Center (KUAC) before, so I hope we can collaborate and do something together even more than before. I would like to build a deeper and more stimulating relationship.

Now, Mr. Hosaka. Please tell us what you expect from the standpoint of a public museum and as an alumnus.

It is very interesting that KeMCo is now daring to try to do things with the word "vacant lot," which is hardly a suitable catchphrase for a museum.

I think it is a story that also gives a lot of suggestions for the way of collaboration that many national and public art museums have as a challenge. Just as Keio once created an art management course early on and stimulated the art industry, I hope that this time, with a new form of museum, you will stimulate a wider area including things other than art.

I have received an excessive evaluation of KeMCo, so I want to do my best not to disappoint everyone.

After all, I think the key to making use of being small and agile is to have many people help us, so I would be grateful if you could continue to support KeMCo and cooperate from time to time through the connection of participating in this roundtable discussion today.

I hope you will definitely come to play in our vacant lot. I look forward to seeing you in person next time, rather than on Zoom. Thank you very much for the long time today.