The presentation will focus on the processes that led to the building up of a museum dedicated to European history, a project of the European Parliament which has gotten attention since 2007 when the idea was introduced by Hans-Gert Pöttering (then the President of the European Parliament). How to go about a project guarded by politicians and run by historians and museum practitioners? How to build up a narrative on such a complex and diverse topic where even a geographical definition of Europe is debatable? How to find consensus on a narrative and avoid being propagandistic or teleological? How to present the narrative in a way that it would be understood by all, from which ever part of Europe or the world? The presentation will give examples of a plethora of dilemmas – as well as some solutions – on which the Academic Project Team was working throughout the creation of a narrative and its musealisation since the beginning of 2011 when the work on the content of the history museum in Brussels started.

The House of European History opened in May 2017. Since then the reactions, criticism and accolades prove how sensitive the topics are with which the museum is dealing in today's European reality.

Wine and snacks will be served.