Mexico City 2017

Ciudad de México 2017

Museums of Cities and Contested Urban Histories, Mexico City 30-31 October 2017

Maya Devalos, President of ICOM Mexico, Joana Monteiro, Chair of CAMOC, and Yanni Herreman, the conference organiser, former President of ICOM-LAC and one of CAMOC's first members. At the Museuo Nacional de Culturas, the conference venue.

We took ICOM’s theme for 2017 as our starting point. To control the past is to control our present and future. There may be facts in history, but it’s their interpretation which matters – you tell me your truth and I’ll tell you mine. Even the facts themselves are contested – no, it did not happen is a frequent comment. We now even refer to alternative facts. And there are facts we would prefer to forget. Yet things do happen, people die, Palmyra gets destroyed and the why and how does not seem to matter much.

Saying the unsayable about our history is a difficult area for museums to explore, but this what we aimed to address in our conference.

You can download the proceedings here

Chris Reynolds: "Dealing with the legacy of the past is the principal challenge facing Northern Irish society and the cause of the conflict remains a highly contested political issue."

Catherine Cole, Canada, Bonginkosi Zuma, South Africa, Eric Sandweiss, USA

The great pyramid at Teotihauacan, once the largest city in pre-Columbian Mexico. One of the excursions organised by our hosts.

Conference Partners:

ICOM CAMOC |ICOM Disaster Risk Management Committee |Mexico City Museum (Museo de La Ciudad de México) | ICOM Mexico: http://www.icommexico.mx/ | ENCRyM - National School of Conservation, Restoration and Museography, National Institute of Anthropology and History/La Escuela Nacional de Conservación, Restauración y Museografía, Instituto Nacional de Antropologìa e Historia): http://www.encrym.edu.mx/ Secretario de Cultura, Gobierno de la Ciudad de México: http://www.cultura.cdmx.gob.mx/

We would like in particular to thank Yani Herreman of Mexico City, a CAMOC member and former President of ICOM-LAC who has contributed so much to the organisation of this conference.

Migration:Cities | (im)migration and arrival cities

Detailed information about our continuing Migration:Cities project is set out in the Workshops section of our web site. We have held one workshop so far in Athens (plus an earlier one in Glasgow). The second project was on 28 October, just before the conference itself. It took place at the Museo Nacional de las Culturas, National Museum of Cultures- see below.

Main courtyard. Museo Nacional de las Culturas. National Museum of Cultures. INAH. Ciudad de México

China Hall. Museo Nacional de las Culturas, National Museum of Cultures, INAH, Ciudad de México.

Mexico City Museum