APM President Calls for New Standards for Italy's 10,000 Small Museums

Giancarlo Dall'Ara, president of APM – Associazione Piccoli Musei, argues that Italian cultural policy fails to distinguish between large and small museums, treating them with undifferentiated standards that penalize smaller institutions. He asserts that a small museum is not a scaled-down version of a large one but a different concept rooted in local community and hospitality. Current regulations, he claims, are inadequate, incomplete, and wrong: they ignore the centrality of human resources and welcome, exclude small museums from funding, and impose impossible requirements. Dall'Ara proposes a decalogue for small museums, emphasizing that their identity depends on people, not size, and that they should be evaluated on community ties and visitor experience rather than visitor numbers or opening hours. He notes that Italy has about 10,000 small museums versus a few hundred large ones, and calls for simple, specific norms to help them emerge rather than close. The article, published on Artribune, highlights the need for new standards tailored to Italy's predominantly small-museum landscape.