Museums in times of multiple crises. Krytyka Polityczna debate

Today, the word museum evokes not only associations with building collections or protecting heritage, but also with a whole range of ways to spend free time: visits to exhibitions, workshops, debates on current topics, and meetings with artists. The debate about whether institutions are closer to temples or forums seems misguided from a contemporary perspective—without viewers, without an audience, museums today seem to be losing their raison d'être. In the past, the answer to the question about the role of museums in times of crisis seemed to be simply to continue to exist, to protect the collections, and the price of temporary inaccessibility to the public did not seem too high.