Ode to Pauline Kruseman | You have always encouraged, that especially women could develop themselves

This text was translated using AI and may contain errors. If you have suggestions or comments, please contact us at info.ode@amsterdammuseum.nl.

Dear Pauline,

Your importance to the city of Amsterdam, of course, I don't need to demonstrate more. You were awarded the IJ Prize Amsterdam in 2007 (for people who have made a special contribution to Amsterdam) and the Golden Museum Medal of the City of Amsterdam in 2008. But that doesn't tell you what your contribution was. I would like to illustrate this with a few examples in which I have been involved. Here is just a small sample of your achievements.

During the time (1991 to 2008) that you were director of the Amsterdam Historical Museum, major changes took place in the museum world. Also in our museum. More attention was paid to the general public, to education and marketing, and new presentation techniques were introduced. This fitted well with your ideas, because your heart was with the collection as well as with education and presentation. From your husband and art collector Jan Maarten Boll, you had already learned the importance of looking closely and enjoying art. 
You put together exhibition teams with not only curators, but also educators, marketing staff, collection managers and conservators. Each discipline was given its own role in the process. You set the frameworks, and you gave the teams the confidence and space to create something beautiful together. “Because,” you said, ”you never bring projects to fruition alone.” At each opening, you also emphatically put the entire team in the spotlight.

The New Permanent Exhibition (1995 - 2000)
On your initiative, we talked extensively at the museum in the early 1990s about changes in the permanent exhibition. We devised plans for how we could also become attractive to visitors with less museum experience, including, of course, school students. Eventually the plan arose to renew the entire permanent display from 1975 in phases and pay more attention to the 20th century. 
In 1992, at the invitation of the American Embassy, and with your blessing, I was allowed to visit 40 museums in the United States for a month. The emphasis was on the use of multimedia and interactive presentations, because they were much further ahead with that in the US. We could, of course, put those experiences to good use in our own museum.

You called in your friend Frits Spangenberg of the Motivaction research bureau. He taught us to think more specifically in terms of target groups, specific characteristics and needs. That whole innovation was completed in 1999 with a beautiful presentation on the 20th century.

Couture Locale, Amsterdam Fashion 1950 - 2000 (2000/2001)
This fashion exhibition on Amsterdam fashion designers was special and innovative in many ways. We felt it was important to attract young fashion lovers as well. Once again, we engaged Motivaction to research what would appeal to this target group. In any case, not too much text, a theatrical design, beautiful contemporary garments - to see and to feel. Curator Annemarie den Dekker found the perfect designer in the person of set and costume designer Tatyana van Walsum. She came up with a design in which the garments were not in distantly closed display cases, and there was a room where you could feel fabrics. We briefly considered whether to ask you to wear a creation by a contemporary Amsterdam designer for the opening, but we suspected we wouldn't be doing you any favors.

The new depot in Amsterdam North (2008)
The museum's own collection is the backbone and core of every museum. It is an important museum task to preserve, maintain, open up, expand and present that collection for new generations. I'm sure you can identify with this. When you took office, you were immediately told that there should be one depot for all objects. Easy to ask, but of course that would require additional funds. But with your large network, intensive lobbying of council members and countless diplomatic talks with aldermen, you managed to get approval from the city council for the required amount. Architect Wim Quist was engaged to make a design and we put together a special and excellent museum team to monitor the preconditions well. Just before your departure, the first pile was driven for the depot in Amsterdam Noord. A year later was the opening.

External contacts
Some projects were followed up nicely. After the exhibition 'Toen Hier, Amsterdam in het laatste oorlogsjaar' (1995), the National Committee 4 and 5 May asked you to become its chairman. Between 1996 and 2004 we saw you at the commemoration of the dead on Dam Square, where you walked alongside the queen.

Through the exhibitions “The World Within Reach” and “Peter the Great,” we got contacts with the Art Chamber and the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. For me that was the beginning of a whole series of workshops in Eastern Europe - especially in Ukraine - which I look back on with great pleasure. You gave me all the space I needed to develop in that. Both of us are still in contact with museum staff in St. Petersburg and in Ukraine. 

In conclusion
Now, as an 82-year-old, you are to me an example of how a woman can age well. Even though you have to miss your beloved Jan Maarten, you carry on and have a richly filled life with family, friends and former colleagues. “Yes, that's how I was raised by my father,” I hear you say.
But what woman your age goes by herself in the car to visit friends in Austria, visit family in Switzerland, travel regularly to the U.S. and rent a car at the airport there? And who - with a broken wrist - goes to visit her friend in England anyway? I don't think you call yourself a feminist, but you are. You have always encouraged, that women in particular could develop.

So this is my tribute to you, Pauline. And now let's get on with our ambassador task for the Amsterdam Museum.

Anneke van de Kieft, educator at the Amsterdam (Historical) Museum from 1979 - 2016