Uncomfortable Art Tour: British Museum (Scholar-Activism Conference)

Display it like you stole it: the history (and future) of the British Museum

Uncomfortable Art Tours are exactly what they sound like.

In a country that’s repeatedly failed to come to terms with its colonial past, led by politicians who seem to think the past is the future, we seek to resist triumphalist nostalgia with art history.

These tours focus on how major institutions came into being against a backdrop of imperialism. At this tour, we’ll unravel the role colonialism played in shaping and funding these collections, looking at the broader material history of celebrated works. The history of British art is also the history of empire and genocide, written by collectors who traded in landscapes and lives.

How did the narratives of Empire come into being? Who controls them? And how can we learn to see through the triumphalism to the truth?

This tour is for attendees of the Scholar-Activism in the 21st Century conference