Heritage Infrastructures: Museums without Walls

Studio leader: Pieter Swart 

Recent conversations in the field of museology and curation have drawn attention to the practice of regenerative ecosystems. This practice underscores the need for strategies to confront and rectify colonial and neo-colonial legacies of extraction, erasure, and misinterpretation that museums have inherited from previous centuries. More critically, however, proponents of this strategy assert that museums often still perpetuate problematic curatorial practices from the past. As a result, there is a growing call for museums to be integrated into local and global ecosystems to  face complexities that were previously easy to ignore at a distance, but that have become increasingly urgent to negotiate and navigate (Blankenberg, 2023). Within the architectural field, the framework of regenerative ecosystems raises significant questions that necessitate a careful re-evaluation of the role of museums – their influence, responsibilities, and relevance in society – and the ecosystem of exhibitions, archives, repositories, and infrastructure that they incorporate. In recognition of, and further anticipating, the possibilities of a radically adapted field of heritage design and museum practices, the Heritage Infrastructures Studio will investigate the ambivalent peripheries, interfaces, and infrastructures encountered between Freedom Park and Salvokop. The studio aims to develop speculative and contextually sensitive small scale architectural responses that facilitate experimental preservation practices and resilience within the framework of regenerative ecosystems. Through rigorous research, conceptual development, and physical prototyping processes, students will be empowered to develop critical solutions that address existing boundaries. The conception of museums without walls will be employed to activate the marginalised and peripheral through living heritage practices.