20 February 2025
With Anna Cornelius and Gerald van der Wijngaart
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Check all recordings in the series The Activist Museum: going deeper

‘What’s in a title?’, you might ask. And, more specifically, what’s in an exhibition title? In a polarised society, where social media contributes a great deal in influencing people’s behaviour and opinions based just on headlines and catchy words, there may be quite a lot in exhibition title. Museums which are conscious of their political role and wish to inform, inspire and engage people in a dialogue on not always consensual subjects, are very much aware that a title might be the single factor that will make a person decide to visit or not to visit, to engage or to ignore.

Anna Cornelius (Wellcome Colletion) and Gerald van der Wijngaart (Rijksmuseum) are working for institutions that have blazed a trail in the museum field. Both working in communications and marketing, both trying to create a bridge between their organisations and society, they have generously accepted to talk to us a bit more about the challenges they are facing and ways of dealing with them.

Bionotes

Anna Cornelius has held communications roles in museums, galleries, archives, theatres and public art festivals around the UK. As Head of Communications & Marketing for Wellcome Collection, she connects audiences with London’s free museum and gallery dedicated to health and human experience. She’s also a trustee for Headlong Theatre and the People’s History Museum. Anna is disabled but can pass as non-disabled. She spends a lot of time thinking about what it really means to make arts and culture accessible for everyone.

Gerald van der Wijngaart has been a marketing enthusiast since working in a youth center and asking himself the question ‘why doesn’t anyone show up to our wonderful programming?’ Since then he has had numerous marketing roles in museums, theatre, music and television. As Brand Manager of the Rijksmuseum he works on making the museum as accessible possible to the broadest audience possible without losing the core elements of the museum out of sight. He is an avid believer in social mobility and the key role that art can play in this.