When I enter a museum I think that the glass cases and roped off sections give everything a sense of being valuable or rare. While I do believe that it depends on who the person is, and what they consider to be of value determines how much value a certain item or entire museum can hold for the individual. One of my experiences I can remember was going to the Museum of Flight in Seattle with my dad when I was younger. My dad loves planes and flying and the entire history of aviation, while I was just admiring the museum because I felt like I was supposed to. Clearly, the museum had a much greater impression on my dad, who appreciated the content more, than it had on me. Although I did enjoy the museum, since I was younger I feel like I didn’t necessarily appreciate all that the museum had to offer. Age is definitely a factor to consider when thinking about ways of seeing when it comes to museums. If I would have been older visiting I probably would have been able to take in more of the historical aspect that the museum had to offer. Just being in a museum, for me, creates this sense of value and respect for the collections within it. Compared to things I see in everyday life, objects in a museum always seem to hold my attention longer. I really do think that just because something is placed in a museum, it holds a heightened value. Ordinary objects outside of a museum don’t hold much value, but placed in a museum with some great story attached, and all of the sudden value is present. I think this is because we as people have a fascination with the past along with anything that we believe to be of great value.
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Age as a parameter to establish context is a museums nightmare. A museum of flight to appeal to a child’s interest would have to involve magic like Mary Poppins, Peter Pan, or the super heroes. A big piece of metal that survived World War 2 can’t mean much to someone with little sense of aviation history. That being said, you gained a small appreciation based on another persons interest. Your Dad did pass on a piece of himself to you that day, which may be as important as if you would have appreciated the planes more. His context passed to his daughter meant more than if you had visited the museum with classmates of the day, or perhaps even if you made a solo visit to that museum today. Your memory of that museum experience was about context.
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