A valorização da função do objecto de design em contexto museológico : lógicas expositivas - a museologia do design industrial

The design objects give us a testimony of those who imagined, designed, developed, manufactured and used them. Each object, intentionally or not, portrays its own story, all the visible details are part of a decision taken by someone at some time of its chronology. The act of collecting objects, as well as private collections are the basis for the creation of museums as we know them today. Musealization - taking objects into a museum - means that one is restoring, preserving, enhancing some objects compared to others. And when restoring these objects, one is restoring their symbolic capacity, i.e. the fact that they tell a story, means you are restoring its message. In a museum, although out of context and deprived of most of the functions to which they had been designed for, the objects acquire other function(s), preserving their importance. Design museums give us the possibility to have a closer view of the objects, rather than just look at them, along with the pedagogical function. Thus presents a proposal for museography regarding industrial design, which is based on the appreciation of the function of anonymous design objects, based on expository logic, that takes the visitor to see, instead of just looking at objects, offering the possibility of interaction with the same, increasing the relationship between human being - object - museum, including groups with special needs, which are often forgotten in these exhibitions. This dissertation is a reflection and a projectual intervention on the design object in a museum, clarifying the concepts of object and museum, covering issues regarding the relevance of design museums, and culminating in the presentation of a museography project, where the function of an object prevails

Libraries and Canon-Formation: the Case of English in the Collections of the Library of the Faculty of Humanities, Lisbon University

Abstract: The project for researching the role played by libraries in canon-formation (namely through their policies regarding the creation, organization, preservation, and utilization of the collections) will be presented and discussed. We selected the Library of the Faculty of Humanities, Lisbon University, a modern academic library, created in 1859, by royal decree of D. Pedro V, following his canonical choice. Actually, the two contemporary rulers of new Britannia— Prince Albert, his cousin, and Queen Victoria—held this king in high consideration for his outstanding contribution to Portuguese modernisation. Representing various fields of study, the collections were decisive to canon-formation in the Faculty of Humanities. Thus, we have been trying to answer the following questions: who has been creating, organizing, preserving, and utilizing the collections, from the mid-nineteenth century onwards? When, where and how? Presently, we are studying the collections in English, namely the works belonging or referring to the long nineteenth century. Richard Garnett’s “The International Library of Famous Literature” (London, 1899) is our first case-study. The anthology determined the Western literary, cultural and visual canon at the turning of the century, as evidenced by comparing it to the Portuguese and Spanish editions, published at the beginning of the twentieth century.