The second edition of the International Museum Expo, where museum practitioners and stakeholders interact and exchange ideas, will be held at Science City over two days from Saturday.

The first edition of the expo was held last year at Pragati Maidan under the Union ministry of culture. This year, it has shifted to Science City, focusing on science museums. Science City in Calcutta pioneered the science museum movement in the country.

The broad theme for the expo this year will be “Museums for Education and Research” with several sub-themes.

The idea of the International Museum Expo is to bring together museum professionals, private companies, start-ups, creative minds, architects and IT professionals who contribute to the development of museums in different capacities for an exchange of ideas, networking, infotainment, and peer-to-peer interaction and learning with each other.

“After the grand success of the first edition of the International Museum Expo 2023 in New Delhi, it was decided to hold the second edition at Science City, in Calcutta, with a focus on science museums,” said A.D. Choudhury, director general, National Council of Science Museums (NCSM).

The Expo will have exhibitions on various themes, keynote addresses, parallel sessions, panel discussions, presentations by science museum professionals from across the world, master classes by experts in the field, various activities, science demonstrations, a marketplace for start-ups and innovators, a special exhibition on innovation, a special corner for Indian women in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math), etc. Apart from these, international science museums and science museum professionals will be invited to attend the expo,” said Anurag Kumar, director, Science City.

After the inauguration, the keynote address at the expo will be given by Sarah Kenderdine, a professor of Digital Museology in Switzerland since 2017. There will be several panel discussions, including one on the preservation and documentation of cultural, scientific and industrial heritage.

True to its theme, several discussions on science museums like de-mystifying physics through interactive demonstrations and immersive experiences will be held. Anusheela Chatterjee Group from The Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Hyderabad, will stage a science theatre.

Several master classes will be held, including one on astrophotography, developing mathematical kits and others. The Science Museum Group from London will also participate.

The Birla Industrial and Technological Museum (BITM) will be the venue for exhibitions including one on Oppenheimer’s Peaceful Explosion, the cyclorama as a canvas for Indian artistry, using technology in interactive museum story-telling, the structures of science communication and other such themes.

Competitions for school students, including an ideathon on what they want to see in a science museum, innovative student projects and one for architects on newage architecture for science centres are also on the schedule.

A film on Durga Puja will also be shown.

There will be 45 stalls at Science City, including one by the Indian Museum which will showcase Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based reconstructions of ancient sculptures and hands-on training in traditional preservation methods. The stall by Kolkata Centre for Creativity will showcase its conservation lab and in-situ conservation demonstrations.