How to make remote art relevant? How to make classical museums contemporary? How to connect youth with the older? Simply: hear them.

National Gallery of Slovenia, Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, Gallery of Matica Srpska, and Innovación Social Emprendedor Social have joined in the HearMe project to co-create a profound museum experience with young people that changes the way they approach the world around them. Times demand nothing less. With 21st century migrations, Europe is facing a change of biblical proportions. We need to rationalize what is happening. We need empathy, the ability to put yourself in someone else’s position. Through HearMe workshops, museum educators, teachers, and youth embark on a journey towards empathy and away from intolerance. The HearMe workshops build on several methodologies (BrickMe, Design Thinking, Gamification, open art dialogue) and adapts them to museums. In the workshop, we construct own statements out of physical material. Although everybody uses the same material, each model looks different. We explore the differences and similarities through critical thinking. We contextualize our positions. Everything becomes more complex. Connections are made, relations between models are built. Our absolutist view becomes part of an intricate web. Then, a hypothetical situation arises and we have to solve it. Who moves where? What does that mean? Who does it affect? Employing teamwork, ingenuity, problem solving, and social skills, we co-create a solution. Through mobiles, it goes viral. It is time to use the realizations of our journey to interact with art. In museum permanent collections, we explore art made by migrant artists, migrant motifs, and works that moved between countries. Why were they moved? What did they leave behind? How did they change? How would we act in a similar situation? Thus, through a series of exercises, art becomes alive. Now, it is a part of solutions to pressing issues. Now, we understand. Now, we work together. Now, we hear. (Source: EC)

HearMe Museum Manual (2017)
Fun, clear and practical
The manual offers an introduction into methodology that was developed through the course of the project. Starting with tools and ways of thinking that one needs to programme HearMe workshops, we continue with concrete examples developed by partner museums and conclude with an overview of workshop experiences and what did and did not work.