Session 07- L’écomusée singulier et pluriel - Presentation of Hugues de Varine’s book

"The seventh webinar was a special one, as the Babel Tower had the honour to present the Italian version of recent Hugues de Varine’s book, L’écomusée singulier et pluriel (2017). This webinar has been co-organized with the Italian Network of Ecomuseums and the editor of the Italian version, Cooperativa Utopie Concrete. Alberto Garlandini, Raul dal Santo, Maurizio Tondolo and Donatella Murtas introduced with words of acknowledgement for de Varine’s work. Then, Giuseppe Reina posed some questions collectively elaborated during a meeting conducted in early March by the Italian Network of Ecomuseums. After a critical reading of the chapter of the book dedicated to Italian ecomuseums, the Network has collectively decided the questions. Main topics were: the relation between Italian regional laws and funding; transversality of ecomuseums as actors of integrated development; relations between the ecomuseums and museums; relation between ecomuseums and landscape planning in the framework of the European Landscape Convention; the role of regional and national networks; ecomuseums and tourism; self-evaluation and self-sustainability of the processes.
Hugues de Varine gave his comments highlighting the importance of economic independence of ecomuseums from regional political assets, specifying the transversal character of ecomuseums even if the administrative offices are organized differently. De Varine pointed out the importance of people inside public offices creating transversality beyond the administrative boundaries. He stressed the main differences between ecomusuems and museums, having the latter ones a collection to manage while the first ones are more centred around a broader concept of territorial heritage. In terms of networking, de Varine recalled the important Italian experience of Mondi Locali, and pointed out how importance is to keep a certain degree of informality in the networks. Regarding tourism, it has been discussed how the type of tourism related with ecomuseums is more a proximity and relational tourism: it is not mass tourism rather, it is a way for creating community ties based on hospitality. In terms of self-evaluation and self-sustainability, he gave the advice that each ecomuseum has to find its way and tools, such as the community maps; the latter could be importance means as they can be used not only as a tool for producing a system of common knowledge, but also as a tool aimed at collectively programming or a at self-evaluation. Then, he had a meaningful conversation with students as agents of change for the future." Giusy Pappalardo