The ‘rough and tumble’: displaying complexity in the motor museum

Abstract

The motor museum is traditionally a place to present motor vehicles as objects of art, speed and prestige to be admired and cherished by enthusiasts. At the same time, some museums have tried to present motor vehicles within a social history context, largely in order to attract a wider visitor base. Even so, transport museums and motor museums more specifically have considerable difficulty in displaying the more complex story of motoring, which takes in the full range of human interaction with the motor vehicle. This includes the tragedy of road trauma. This paper examines displays in some of the biggest and best-known museums in Britain and Europe and asks whether it is possible to offer visitors a more complex motoring story using the material culture of motoring.

Keywords:

• transport museums
• motor museums
• material culture of motoring
• social history
• complexity in museums
• post-museum
• social responsibility

Acknowledgements

My thanks to Kurt Möser, curator of the exhibition including the crashed car at the Landesmuseum für Technik und Arbeit, for discussing this exhibition with me in January 2009 and to Tim Bryan, Head of Collections and Interpretation at the Heritage Motor Centre in Gaydon, England. My thanks also to the anonymous referees of MMC for their comments. The research for this project was funded by the University of New England.

Notes

1. This paper is based on research undertaken from the collections and displays at the following museums during 2008–2009: National Transport Museum of Ireland, Howth, Ireland; Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, Belfast, Northern Ireland; Glasgow Museum of Transport, Glasgow, Scotland; Cars of the Stars Motor Museum, Keswick, England; Heritage Motor Centre, Gaydon, England; Coventry Transport Museum, Coventry, England; Haynes International Motor Museum, Sparkford, England; National Motor Museum, Beaulieu, England; London Transport Museum, London, England; Swiss Transport Museum, Lucern, Switzerland; Landesmuseum für Technik und Arbeit, Mannheim, Germany; Mercedes-Benz Museum, Stuttgart, Germany; Musée National de l’ Automobile, Mulhouse, France; Musée de la Voiture et du Tourisme, Compiègne, France. Although American museums would have provided useful data for this paper, to include them in the fieldwork examples is beyond the scope of this project.

2. Display board text, le Musée National de l'Automobile, Mulhouse, France, January 2009.

3. See for example the exhibition of Ignatius Sancho. Items usually displayed as decorative arts were re-ordered to tell a different historical story. Objects in another exhibition were displayed in alphabetical order.

4. Display board text, Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, Belfast, Northern Ireland, 2008.

5. Display board text, Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, Belfast, Northern Ireland, 2008.

6. Display board text, Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, Belfast, Northern Ireland, 2008.

7. Display board text, Glasgow Museum of Transport, Scotland, December 2008.

8. Display board text, Glasgow Museum of Transport, Scotland, December 2008.

9. Display board text, National Motor Museum, Beaulieu, England, December 2008.

10. Display board text, Mercedes-Benz Museum, Stuttgart, Germany, January 2009.

11. The museum building is not unique in its application of the double helix form. See the Château de Chambord begun in 1519.