RT Journal Article
T1 ‘Contemplative wonder’: the potential for learning in museum open storage
A1 Yuen Ting Yiu
YR 2025
VO 
IS Autumn 2025
K1 adults
K1 affective power
K1 contemplative wonder
K1 imagination
K1 museum learning
K1 open storage
K1 wonder
AB Developing from the principle of democratising collections, there is an increasing call to turn museum open storage into places for visitors’ learning. Much of the existing literature has suggested that encountering huge collections without interpretation or guidance can be overwhelming for visitors (Dawes, 2016; Slater, 1995). However, an emerging counterargument suggests that open storage without curation empowers visitors to explore the area freely and enjoy unexpected encounters with objects within vast collections (Bond, 2018; Keene, 2005, Thiemeyer, 2017). Using a case study of the Open Store in the National Railway Museum (NRM), York, this paper examines the potential for embodied learning in open storage seen through the lens of contemplative wonder (Schinkel, 2017, 2020). It argues that contemplative wonder is an important learning tool with strong affective power and the ability to stimulate imagination. Using qualitative data gained from adult visitors through accompanied visits, personal mind maps and interviews, this article demonstrates that the distinctive characteristics of museum open storage can indeed evoke visitors’ contemplative wonder. The visit experience had strong affective power and stimulated visitors’ imaginations. The potential of contemplative wonder for learning is evident since it encouraged visitors to connect to their personal experiences, generate questions, and exhibit reasoning and expressing a view on world development. Interestingly, this study also found that in the setting of museum open storage, feelings of confusion and being overwhelmed were always found when visitors experienced contemplative wonder, leading to the conclusion that these two feelings are not necessarily hindrances to visitors’ learning as existing literature suggests.  
NO Bond (2018) and Caesar (2007) explore the potential of open museum storage in fostering learning through visitor studies. However, Caesar explores it by focusing on store tours, but not the unmediated self-led visit which is the focus of this research. Despite not being a published literature, Dawes (2016) gives us some interesting insight from her study on the visitors’ perception on open museum storage. She also touches upon the topic in terms of visitors’ learning.  
NO Anders Schinkel is not the only one who sheds light on the affective element of wonder, but he has been the only one systemically discussing and heavily focusing on this based on the works of preceding philosophers, including Fuller (Wonder: From emotion to spirituality, 2006), Hadzigeorgiou (2014), Opdal (2001) and Parsons (Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 1969). Schinkel (2017, 2020) clusters wonder into broadly two types – inquisitive wonder and contemplative wonder or deep wonder. For Schinkel, inquisitive wonder carries the conventional perception of wonder – ‘an intense and focused searching quality’ to answer the questions (Schinkel, 2020, p 38), whereas contemplative wonder values questioning over answering. 
NO Falk and Dierking (The Museum Experience, 2011) criticise the inability in distinguishing learning, education and schools hinders the full understanding of learning, where learning cognitive information is always the focus. Hohenstein and Moussouri (Museum Learning: Theory and Research as Tools for Enhancing Practice) suggest using the term ‘meaning making’ instead of learning in museum setting as the former term allows us to capture not only cognitive but also aesthetic and kinaesthetic aspects of learning. Although using a different term, all views here suggest that cognitive gain is not the primary focus of museum learning. 
NO Mezirow (2008) defines transformative learning as a process by which people reflect on and challenge their existing frames of reference, eventually transforming them to more ‘inclusive, discriminating, open, reflective and emotionally able to change’ (p 26).  
NO Bond (2018) demonstrates the value of open storage (‘visitable storage’ she coined) in terms of serendipity, transparency and wonder. Lamentably, she does not show a comprehensive understanding of wonder. Moreover, her separation of serendipity from wonder – relating wonder to the entire collection in store, whereas serendipity to object(s) – is not given justifications. 
PB The Science Museum Group
SN 2054-5770
LA eng
DO 10.15180/252404
UL https://journal.sciencemuseum.ac.uk/article/contemplative-wonder-the-potential-for-learning-in-museum-open-storage/
WT Science Museum Group Journal
OL 30