Report: "Deaccessioning: Sharing Experiences from Finland"

The Finnish Museums Association, in collaboration with several other partners, has recently published the English version of a report entitled Deaccessioning: Sharing Experiences from Finland. This web publication based on two joint projects on deaccessioning involving three museums of cultural history and three art museums and their web publications in Finnish from 2015 and 2016. In the first project, the cultural history museums compiled tools for deaccessioning in accordance with museum ethics. The second project focused on the views of art museums regarding deaccessioning and the joint challenges in this area faced by all museums. Key questions addressed by the publication include the following:

• What does deaccessioning in museums of cultural history and art museums have in common?
• What are the differences in deaccessioning needs and practices between museums of different kinds?

The museums of cultural history in the projects were the Helsinki City Museum, the Historical Collections of the Tampere Museums and the Museum of Technology. The perspective of art museums was represented by Aboa Vetus & Ars Nova, the HAM Helsinki Art Museum and the Tampere Art Museum. The resulting publication underscores the viewpoints of the museums participating in the project and practical examples of deaccessioning. The challenges of deaccessioning are shared by all museums, although practical solutions may differ. The institutions involved in the project wanted to make the Finnish discussion on these matters available to international readers. The publication addresses the following themes:

• the attitudes of Finnish museums regarding deaccessions;
• the deaccessioning process described briefly;
• accounts of deaccessioning; and
• specific cases from the museums of the project, addressing three themes: significant collections, lifespan and disposal methods.

The English translation of the publication was prepared with financial support from the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture The report Deaccessioning: Sharing Experiences from Finland is available on the website of the Finnish Museums Association at http://www.museoliitto.fi/index.php?k=12613