Welcome to Museums Arven!

Published January 2, 2023

the museums heritage logo

Stjørdal museum Værnes, Levanger photo museum, Stiklestad National Cultural Center, Nils Aas Art Workshop and Egge museum have for a number of years been part of a large museum community. From 2023, this organization has been given a new name: while the names of the individual museums remain, the community is now called Museene Arven.

Some may be surprised that five seemingly different museums have been merged. The reason is the major museum reform that reorganized the whole of museum Norway in the early 2000s. In order to ensure stronger professional environments and better use of resources, the majority of the country's museums were brought together in so-called consolidated museums. For our part, it happened in two stages: first in 2004 and then in 2010.

Since 2010, our five museums have grown together into a strong museum community. At the same time as we focus on the uniqueness of the individual museums, we are linked by our common ambition of what kind of museum we want to be for, in and together with society. The ambition is set out in the development plan "Where stories meet". Here it is stated that, in the run-up to the National Jubilee in 2030, we shall excel nationally and internationally, through our focus on cultural heritage's contemporary and societal value, dialogue and co-creation. In this lies a high ambition to further develop our museums as important democratic institutions: by creating arenas where stories meet, we shall contribute to a viable democracy.

For the first 18 years, the museum community was called the Stiklestad National Cultural Center (SNK), i.e. the same as one of the individual museums. In June 2021, however, our owners decided, as part of a larger ownership process, that the company should get a new name. In short, this means no name change for our five individual museums: they will still be called Egge museum, Nils Aas Kunstverksted, Stiklestad National Cultural Center, Levanger photo museum and Stjørdal museum Værnes. What is being renamed is the joint organisation. We are positive about this change: it has sometimes been a demanding exercise, both for the community and for the museum at Stiklestad, to communicate well when two different levels of the organization have the same name. When the news about the name change came, we also had a strong desire: to get a name that both says something about what characterizes us as a museum community and that can become a useful tool in the work going forward. After many good discussions, we ended up with Museene Arven, a name we have already grown to like.

Heritage is a word that links our museums together. We work with cultural heritage, with the legacy of Sigrid på Egge, Nils Aas, Harald Renbjør and Martin Moe, with Olav's legacy and player heritage, with the legacy of the region's women and men and various minorities, with rock art and much more. In addition, the new name invites to discuss what heritage really is. This question is very important for us who work in museums, but it should also be a central part of the larger societal debate. Because: what ends up with the label cultural heritage is never neutral or natural. It is a result of choices made by those who have lived before, by us who live today and which have great significance for both our understanding of society and our understanding of ourselves. With the name Museene Arven, we want to shine a spotlight on precisely this dynamic and powerful side of the phenomenon of heritage. We will use the name to challenge everyone to ask: What stories and traces have been handed down from the past? What stories have not been told and why? How is cultural heritage managed, shaped and used today? What legacy are we passing on and to whom? And: what do I want my legacy to be?

Our work with these questions will of course be shaped by the collections, places and stories that the Heritage Museums manage. Our 46 employees have a large area of responsibility. We operate five museums. In addition, we provide services to Frosta village museum, Inderøy village museum, Leksvik museum, Meråker museums, Mosvik village museum, Snåsa village museum, the Museums in Levanger and Verran museum. From 2023, we will also be responsible for two new dissemination arenas in Steinkjer cultural centre. Our collections consist of 3 art historical objects, 708 cultural historical objects, 73 archaeological objects, 194 photographs, a floating vessel, 57 boats on land, 1 shelf meters of archives and 211 cultural historical buildings. In addition, we have a great responsibility for intangible cultural heritage, i.e. actionable knowledge such as traditional crafts. We also manage 532 cultural landscapes and 13 gardens, we are the producer for the Saint Olav Play and we are the secretariat for "National Jubilee 90 - Norway for a thousand years". This is a massive and diverse mission. We can hardly imagine a better basis for thematizing the societal role of cultural heritage in the past, present and future and for creating valuable museum experiences.

Name choices often create debate. In our case, you can say that this is exactly what we hope for. Museene Arven is a community characterized by its commitment to museums being important, democracy-building institutions. If we are to fulfill such a role, we need society and the present close to us. Community dialogue is therefore a key in everything we do. We hope and believe that our new name will help strengthen this dialogue and make even more people visit our five great museums. We look forward to the road ahead!