ARTH 390 presents Museum Controversies
Coordinated by Amanda Zhang, student in the Graduate Certificate in Curatorial Studies and Practices
The Ethnocultural Art Histories Research Group (EAHR) is proud to launch the Department of Art History vitrine exhibition Museum Controversies, featuring the final projects of students from Alice Ming Wai Jim’s course ARTH 390 Art and the Museum: Museums and Controversy. Presented in the Department of Art History vitrine from 22 March through 6 April 2026, the exhibition brings together a series of student projects that engage critically with some of the most pressing ethical, political, and institutional debates shaping museums today.
This poster exhibition addresses a range of urgent topics currently at the forefront of global museum discourse. Among these are the ethical stewardship and repatriation of human remains; debates around censorship and institutional responsibility; the ongoing reassessment of monuments commemorating slaveholders and other contentious historical figures; and questions surrounding gender representation within museum collections. The case studies also consider the persistent gaps and silences embedded in archives and institutional narratives, highlighting how marginalized histories have been omitted, suppressed, or overlooked. Proposed through these investigations are new ways of acknowledging, confronting, and reinterpreting these histories within contemporary museum practice.
Collectively, Museum Controversies reflects a growing awareness among emerging art historians and curators that museums are not neutral spaces. Rather, they are sites where histories are negotiated, contested, and continually reimagined. By engaging critically with the structures that shape collections, interpretation, and display, the exhibition encourages viewers to consider how museums can respond more ethically and responsibly to the communities and histories they represent.
This poster exhibition, produced by the Ethnocultural Art Histories Research Group (EAHR) for the Department of Art History vitrine, features final projects by five students in Dr Alice Ming Wai Jim’s fall 2025 course ARTH 390 Art and the Museum: Museums and Controversy. Further developed in collaboration with EAHR mentors during the winter 2026 semester, the academic posters on view represent the culmination of a year’s worth of sustained research, writing, and curatorial work. By translating scholarly research into concise poster formats, Museum Controversies offers a public-facing platform for emerging scholars to showcase new research methods at the intersection of social justice work, critical museology, and ethnocultural art histories.
EAHR’s activities are generously supported by the Gail and Stephen A. Jarislowsky Institute for Studies in Canadian Art and the Concordia University Research Chair in Critical Curatorial Studies and Decolonizing Art Institutions.
