Producing a Media-Rich Permanent Exhibition for the Estonian National Museum as Arts-Based research

The article explores how academic and arts-based research have been combined in curating the contemporary, media-rich exhibition The Time of Freedoms, which is part of the permanent exhibition of the Estonian National Museum. The article shows how the success of exhibition-making practice depends on the skill of switching codes from the more strictly procedure-oriented sociological/ethnological, to an arts-based approach that relies on being processual and performative. After contextualizing the exhibition and positioning the curatorial team, the article discusses three parts/exhibits of The Time of Freedoms exhibition: The Sacrifice Stone and ATM, the Synthesiser of Freedom and the Stories about Freedom. These vignettes are then used to discuss the roles of arts-based research in this exhibition design process and outcome