Professor Souleymane Bachir Diagne“Restitution cannot be simply a return to the kingdom following exile. It must draw on the wealth of new energies and meanings which the objects in question have produced in the art world and will continue to produce after their return, to emphasise that the time has come to reinvent the museum as a realisation of networks and synergies. These objects, which in the words of Amadou Mahtar M’Bow have put down new roots everywhere they have been, now have a role to play in building bridges and thus in forging this new kind of museum network.”
About TheMuseumsLab
Impact
About TheMuseumsLab
At the core of TheMuseumsLab lies TheMuseumsLab Fellowship, a unique African–European joint learning programme for emerging leaders from Museums, Heritage and Art Institutions, and Cultural Spaces. Founded in 2020, it responds to the need for a new kind of cultural collaboration, one that actively addresses the legacies of colonialism and seeks to build a shared, forward-looking cultural future between the two continents. Fundamentally, TheMuseumsLab Fellowship is grounded in the principle of joint learning as a powerful and innovative approach to professional development, institutional transformation, and sector-wide change. Strengthening leadership capacities and creating new transcontinental career paths for museum professionals on both continents is the other key part of this endeavor, providing the foundation for sustainable, long-term change.
TheMuseumsLab brings together professionals from museums, heritage spaces, cultural institutions, academia, and public leadership across Africa and Europe. United by a shared commitment to rethinking the role of museums in society, they have developed and sustained a platform dedicated to the next generation of cultural leaders. It fosters exchange, critical reflection, and co-creation across disciplinary, geographic, and institutional boundaries.
TheMuseumsLab has grown into a set of interconnected initiatives designed to foster transcontinental career paths, sustainable partnerships, and institutional transformation. All TheMuseumsLab activities are based on the belief that truly equitable, connected, and dynamic cultural landscapes can only emerge when knowledge, experience, and imagination are brought into sustained and open dialogue, where perspectives are shared, questioned, and developed together.
TheMuseumsLab is a space for learning and unlearning, for building partnerships rooted in mutual respect, and for imagining museums as inclusive, socially engaged institutions.
Elisabete Pereira | TheMuseumsLab Alumni & Researcher at the University of Évora, Portugal"TheMuseumsLab has been one of the most important remarkable professional experiences of my life! The lectures, the institutional visits, the reflection sessions and everyone's comments and ideas will enable me to be a more competent researcher and teacher in the future. The programme has given me lessons and tools that I am using and sowing."
Vision
TheMuseumsLab aspires to foster a sustainable network of museum leaders that is equipped and empowered to actively shape change towards a joint and more equitable future of museums in Africa and Europe.
Mission
By providing a yearly Fellowship for knowledge exchange, joint learning, unlearning, qualification and professional growth, TheMuseumsLab aims to create space for joint discussions on how museums can confront their colonial past, and meet present societal and global challenges. TheMuseumsLab is dedicated to providing welcoming and supportive environments that celebrate diverse perspectives and where individuals and institutions feel empowered to engage in joint reflections on postcolonial African-European museum cooperation. It aims to inspire the creation of new frameworks and practices and foster a joint understanding of mutually beneficial partnerships.
