Pet Culture Research, Presentation, Interpretation, and Collecting Practice at the Ethnographic Museum, Zagreb, Croatia
In Europe, almost one in two households includes a pet. That totals more than 340 million animals! Animals increasingly go on holidays with us, are pampered with designer products and feature in the perfect online picture of our lives. This pet culture says something about broader social developments in our time. In this ICOM Talk, a trio of speakers will show how one pet exhibition in Croatia's Zagreb opened up a wide spectrum of opportunities for research and audience development, such as oral history in the city and co-creation with a large community.
Pet culture is an urban phenomenon at its very core – a product of the 19th-century bourgeois society. As such, besides the ever-growing pet parent lifestyle worldwide, powered by the explosion of the pet industry, which we all witness daily, its early material traces also exist, in and outside the museums, although often overlooked, not recognized, or even left to ruin, considering the omnipresent attitudes of the subject’s irrelevance, especially compared to traditional fields of research/ collecting policies. However, according to understanding themselves as places of strong social relevance and platforms for questioning and challenging current social values in as many ways possible, the museums of today have a chance to approach yet another societal actuality and act upon the improvement of all lives involved. Hopefully, with more than just pet-friendly propaganda.
Gordana Viljetic, senior curator at Zagreb Ethnographic Museum, takes you on a journey and tells you more about how she went about documenting local pet culture in preparation for the exhibition now on display at the museum. How do you deal with the lack of exhibition material? And how do you combat academic biases and professional stereotypes attached to pet culture?
Want to read more? MuseumNext also published about pets in the museum.
Practical information
- Monday 19 May 2025, 4 - 5 PM (Amsterdam time)
- Free, no need to sign up
- English spoken
- Online via Zoom: Click the button below or copy this link in your browser: https://zoom.us/j/93606750776
Speakers
Dr Zvjezdana Antos (Introduction)
Dr Zvjezdana Antos has been the Director of the Ethnographic Museum in Zagreb since 2023, where she has worked as a museum advisor for 25 years. She studied Ethnology and History and holds a Ph.D. in Cultural Heritage and Museum Studies from the University of Zagreb - Faculty of Philosophy. Antos also works on research dealing with using of new technologies in museums, contemporary collecting, urban and visual anthropology, contemporary culture, creative industries, participatory collecting, European carnival customs, music, and identities. She is the author of the books “European Museums and Globalization” (2012), “The Image Collection” (2017), and “The Furniture Collection” (2022), co-author of “Museums and Innovations” (2017), author of numerous exhibitions, articles, publications, ethnographic films and EU projects as project manager.
Gordana Viljetic (Talk)
Gordana Viljetic is senior curator and Head of the Textile Tools Collection and the Linen Collection at the Ethnographic Museum in Zagreb, where she has been a team member since 2013. She is an Ethnology and Pedagogy graduate from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb. Viljetic is author/co-author/curator of several exhibitions (e.g. 'Of Animals and Humans', 2017-18), interdisciplinary projects, professional papers, and short documentaries/ethnographic films. Her professional interests are oriented toward Cultural Animal Studies, Lifestyle Anthropology, Deaf Culture, Museum Pedagogy, and Audience Development.
Ph.D. Suzana Marjanic (closing words)
Dr Suzana Marjanic works at the Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Research in Zagreb, where she pursues her interests in the theories of myth and ritual, cultural and critical animal studies, and performance studies. She has authored seven books: among them, her work "Chronotop of Croatian Performance: from Traveleri to Today" (2014) earned her the Annual Award of the Croatian Section of AICA and the State Prize for Science. Additionally, her book "Cetera Animantia: From Ethnozoology to Zooethics" (2022) secured her the Annual Award "Milovan Gavazzi." She is the co-editor of 13 anthologies/collections of papers: for instance, she edited the collection of works "Ecofeminism on the Edge: Theory and Practice" (Emerald, 2024) with Goran Durdevic.