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FOUND is a new cultural heritage project that enables access, inclusion and meaningful engagement in public collections. 

“In the past, museum objects were often catalogued without any information related to origin, provenance or donor. Museum professionals in the mid 20th century were more interested in only the  detailed physical descriptions. There are also objects which have been brought to museums and have not been catalogued at all. These reside in a kind of limbo. Many larger museums have thousands of these objects stashed away that were donated 50 or even 100 years ago. Some of the larger museums have rooms dedicated to them.” 

John Björkman Director of Sagalund Museum, Finland

Objects that have lost their identity and connection with the past along with their label, provenance or donor-information, leave museum staff with only the physical object on which to examine and draw conclusions. In this situation, like the objects themselves, archivists are in limbo. Bound by their obligation to preserve and care, museum staff are the custodians of many anonymous objects. Human beings have a natural empathy for orphaned, neglected or lost things and have a tendency to preserve or save. There are many things to be found in the gaps in bureaucratic systems. There is clear evidence that over time and with changes in systems of control, people as well as objects  can all too easily become marginalised and anonymous.

What is FOUND?

• FOUND is a collaborative, audio project which unlocks collections and breaks down barriers to entry through the re-presentation of anonymous objects that languish in the archives of every museum in the world.