Focus: Universal accessibility aims to guarantee access to culture for everyone. In museums, it takes the form of provisions that foster an equitable, inclusive and autonomous visiting experience. This approach rests on the idea that mediation designed around the specific needs of certain audiences can enrich and facilitate the visit for all visitors. It thus questions practices, policies, research and the visitor experience.

Language: English and French (French exclusively for the French-speaking SIG working group engaged in adapting the ‘A Museum for All!’ poster into an easy-to-read and easy-to-understand tool; an English-speaking working group is currently also exploring ways to adapt the ‘A Museum for All!’ poster into its English version. For the English-speaking group, please feel free to contact its referent for further information: alexander.sorokin@me.com).

Open to: Professionals working in the fields of accessibility and inclusion, upon registration.

Calendar of upcoming meetings: Only the sessions of the French-speaking working group are currently scheduled. To take part, please contact the SIG coordinators.

Coordinator: Raffaella Russo-Ricci (raffaella.ricci[at]paris.fr)

About the coordinator

Raffaella Russo-Ricci holds a degree in literature and art history from the Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna (Italy) and in museology and cultural mediation from the École du Louvre. She is head of mediation for the museums of the City of Paris within the public department of Paris Musées. She also teaches cultural mediation at the École du Louvre. She was the national correspondent for France for CECA (2019–August 2026).

Description

Created in 2020, the SIG ‘Universal Accessibility, the Inclusive Museum’ explores the challenges of accessibility and inclusion in museums on an international scale. Its work is based on the principle of universal accessibility, according to which mediation designed around the specific needs of certain audiences can enrich and facilitate the visiting experience for all visitors.

The SIG is above all a space for collaboration, exchange and dialogue between professionals, researchers, teachers, students and people engaged with accessibility issues. Convinced that innovation arises from the confrontation of experiences and viewpoints, it fosters the sharing of good practices, collective reflection and the networking of stakeholders from a variety of cultural contexts.

Its activities take the form of online meetings, project presentations, feedback sessions and working groups devoted to themes related to universal accessibility, inclusive mediation, research, or museum policies. The SIG also designs resources and tools aimed at raising museum professionals’ awareness of inclusion issues and facilitating the integration of good accessibility practices into museum activities and projects.

Interactive poster (some browsers do not support interactivity)
Poster for printing