Assembly and Profanation: On the Question of the Purpose of Play in the Museum

The subject of this research is the potential of play as a means of producing knowledge in the modern museum. The concept of the museum in European culture has undergone numerous transformations over the centuries—from the Greek museions to contemporary museum practices that imply an increase in audience engagement. A museum is not just a repository of objects, nor merely a space for storing cultural values. It is a complex intellectual and emotional field where a constant interplay occurs between the past and the present, between the object and the observer, between form and meaning. Its definition is unstable and transforms depending on the historical context, societal demands, and philosophical concepts. This "gap" between function and content makes the museum an especially interesting subject for research. In this work, we have attempted to view museum activities through the lens of play, based on the ideas of Johan Huizinga, who posited that play is the foundation of culture and a prerequisite for the emergence of most social institutions. A comparative analysis of the concepts of N. Fedorov and G. Agamben was conducted as a general theoretical framework for describing museum activities, allowing us to examine the museum and the processes of sacralization and desacralization that may occur within it. The methodological perspective of Michel Foucault was also applied in the examination of the museum. The novelty of the research lies in the consideration of play not as an auxiliary tool for popularizing knowledge or as an entertainment function, but as a self-sufficient experience. Drawing on the works of Huizinga and R. Caillois, it is shown how the playful nature can be traced in various types of museum activities. The playful nature of the museum is contrasted with the musealization according to G. Agamben—a global process of sacralization that has spread to all spheres of human life and has led to the impossibility of individuals utilizing their own experiences. The only way to counter sacralization, namely to extract humanity from the sacred realm, is through profanation. According to Agamben, play is the instrument of this profanation. A forward-looking question for further research is how play can be returned to its true significance—reinstating the individual's ability to experience their own life and, specifically, the potential to make the museum a space for such experiences.