Tallinn's Kalamaja Museum wins top European prize for community engagement
Tallinn's Kalamaja Museum has won the prestigious Silletto Prize for Community Participation and Engagement at the 2024 European Museum of the Year Awards (EMYA) in Portimão, Portugal.
The Silletto Award was established in 2011 and recognizes museums for their community engagement. The winner of the Silletto Award is selected by a European Museum of the Year Award (EMYA) jury comprising experienced museum and cultural experts from across Europe.
At the award ceremony, the Kalamaja Museum was described as a small community museum that empowers the people in its local area.
"The Kalamaja Museum's core values and mission meet the needs of the community. Residents and visitors are encouraged to participate in, or initiate, new events, exhibitions, tours and activities. This means that it is an ever-changing museum. It works for and with the people, and the range and originality of the projects offered to residents or created by such a small team of museum staff is remarkable," said the judges.
For Kristi Paats, director of the Kalamaja Museum, for a small community museum, winning such a prestigious award is incredible.
"It means a lot to the people of the community who have created the museum themselves. Our heartfelt thanks to the community members, supporters, donors of stories and artefacts, and friends of the museum. This is a tribute to the strong museum community across Estonia. I hope this award will encourage other Estonian museums to think more and more about their communities and to work with them," Paats said.
According to Heli Nurger, director of Tallinn City Museum, a number of new museums have been established in Estonia thanks to the support and initiative of local communities. However, creating a community museum in an urban environment is a big challenge.
"It is an even bigger challenge to become a museum that promotes the identity of the area, talks about history and at the same time has such a strong influence on the face of the district, both today and tomorrow. This is what the small team of women at the Kalamaja Museum have done in recent years– the Kalamaja Museum has become the heart of Kalamaja. Fortunately, visitors to the museum have noticed this and we are really pleased that it has now been recognized with a major European museum award," said Nurger.
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Editor: Karmen Rebane, Michael Cole
