Exhibition Reviews

Arab American National Museum, 13624 Michigan Ave., Dearborn, MI 48126.       Permanent exhibition, opened May 5, 2005. W, F, Sa 10–6, Th 10–8, Su 12–5. Adults $6, children 6–12, students, senior citizens $3, children under 6 free, free for everyone on Sunday. 38,500 sq. ft. Anan Ameri, museum director.       Internet: description of museum and collection, virtual tours, photographs, education resources, calendar of events, related press releases, membership information, and museum store, http://www.theaanm.org/.
Today, the prevalent interpretive model for museums is storytelling. In Dearborn, Michigan (a Detroit suburb perhaps best known as the home of the Ford Motor Company), a new museum opened in May 2005 that tells a story seldom included in the grand narrative of the American experience: the story of Arab Americans.	1
Dearborn's Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services (ACCESS) boldly conceived the Arab American National Museum (AANM) as a national museum charged with presenting the experiences and contributions of Americans of Arab descent. The three-story, 38,500-square-foot museum was designed by Ghafari Associates, a Dearborn-based architecture firm. ACCESS worked with a Cincinnati-based exhibition design firm, Jack Rouse Associates, to develop the museum's exhibition spaces. The total project cost of $15.3 million was funded with contributions from corporate, government, and foundation sponsors.	2
On entering the museum, one passes a library and resource center and a gift- and bookshop before coming into a tiled central courtyard that serves as one of the AANM's permanent exhibit spaces, as well as a performance and reception area. To the left of the courtyard is a temporary gallery used for contemporary art exhibitions. The first-floor courtyard exhibition presents a somewhat lackluster introduction to Arab civilization—cursory displays dealing with a range of subjects: mathematics and astronomy; architecture; medicine; religion; and music and the arts.	3
In contrast, the core exhibition, on the second floor, is a dynamic, engaging three-part installation that utilizes state-of-the-art design strategies. Unlike most museums, the AANM was not built as a repository for things. Instead, it is a repository for stories; artifacts are used as props for telling stories. Remarkably, virtually all of the six hundred objects and more than one thousand paper artifacts (for example, photographs, letters, and certificates) used in the exhibits were donated by the Arab Americans whose individual and family histories are presented in the museum. Although artifacts are used to support the telling of stories, the designers were very much aware of the affective power of "real" objects to engage the museum's visitors.	4
Highlighting the Arab American experience during the great migration of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the "Coming to America" exhibition of the Arab American National Museum features a life-size diorama of an Ellis Island immigration station. Photo by Raymond Silverman. Courtesy Raymond Silverman.   . . . There are about 1307 more words in this article. Please log in (or, if you are not yet an authorized user, please go to the User Setup page) to gain full access rights. Or if you're already logged in register your subscription.