“I believe that with this project we got new visitors, and more important new friends of the museum. Zenica City Museum employees who were involved in the project learned more about accessibility and work with disabled persons”, said Vedrana Mioč, from Zenica City Museum who coordinated the project “Stories from the past”.
“Stories from the past” is a small grant project implemented by Zenica City Museum, and funded by the Balkan Museum Network during 2015. This project was focused on increasing inclusion of disabled people in museum’s work and encouraging their involvement in community activities as well as increasing public awareness about this population in the society.
In this project members of the Association “Lotus” were involved, who are focused on working with children with disabilities, and the Association “Let’s be friends”, a daily center for people older than 18 who have certain mental and physical difficulties.
During four months of the project, Zenica City Museum organized three workshops, working trip to medieval town of Vranduk and the city of Travnik, as well as a small event where the results of this project were presented along with a short amateur documentary.
„I especially liked the cannon in Vranduk and the fortress in Travnik. On workshops we painted and draw different things. I would like to participate in other activities for many more years“, stated Darko Petrović, participant in the project.
The Museum organized painting workshop, a workshop of making greeting cards and bookmarks, and a dance workshop. The main theme of all workshops and the project itself was the medieval period in Bosnia and Herzegovina history.
“Taking part in this project I truly learned about the importance of communication and opening up to different social groups without prejudice. The relationship they have among each other and the amount of love and understanding they have is truly remarkable and admirable. I learned more from them then they from us”, said Mioč.
In the future, Zenica City Museum plans to organize similar activities in order to increase their accessibility to all members of the society.