Graduate Studies Invites: Museum Objects, Health and Healing

Associate Professor Brenda Cowan, Exhibition and Experience Design, presents research from her new book, Museum Objects, Health and Healing, with partners in the museum community. Cowan’s book provides an innovative and interdisciplinary study of the relationship between objects, health and healing. Shedding light on the primacy of the human need for relationships with objects, the book explores what kind of implications these relationships might have on the exhibition experience.

Merging museum and object studies, as well as psychotherapy and the psychology of well-being, the authors present a new theory titled Psychotherapeutic Object Dynamics, which provides a cross- disciplinary study of the relationship between objects, health and well-being. Drawing on primary research in museums, psychotherapeutic settings and professional practice throughout the US, Canada, Bosnia-Herzegovina and the UK, the book provides an overview of the theory’s origins, the breadth of its practical applications on a global level, and a framework for further understanding the potency of objects in exhibitions and daily life.

This event will also feature a panel discussion with Cowan and:

• Jan Ramirez, 9/11 Memorial Museum 
• Tanya Melendez, The Museum at FIT
• Melisa Delibegovic, research associate for War Childhood Museum study
  

And the event will feature “Authors on Objects,” a special set of readings by Leslie Bedford, Libba Bray, Geof Huth, and Ellen Snyder-Grenier

The event is about personal objects and their healing power: Please bring an object to display!

The event is part of the Graduate Studies Invites series, hosted by FIT’s School of Graduate Studies.

This event is free and open to the public; RSVP to [email protected].