Roland Arpin

Roland Arpin (27 April 1934 – 2 September 2010) was an educator, communicator, and public administrator in the Canadian province of Quebec. There, he served as Deputy Minister for Education, Deputy Minister for Culture, and as Director of Working Groups which report to the government of Quebec. He is most known for his work as founder and first Director General of the Musée de la civilisation in the city of Quebec.

Biography and early career Arpin was born in 1934 in Montreal to Jean, a furrier, and Florence (née Courte). He attended a high school run by a catholic order of teaching lay brothers. He decided to join them upon graduation and after a year of novitiate training, he began attending a normal school in Laval-des-Rapides. That same year, after having taught for 12 years at primary to university level, he decided to leave the lay brothers and become a school administrator at the Collège de Maisonneuve in Montreal just at the point in time that it transitioned from being a private, family-run institution to a publicly-funded college. He progressed there from Director of Personnel to the General Director during a five-year span. From 1972 to 1975, he served as president of the Federation of General and Professional Colleges (cegeps) and the Centre for Research and Animation in Education. In 1975, Arpin became Deputy Minister for Planning and Budget at the Quebec Ministry of Education. Many government missions led him abroad as when, from 1976 to 1980, he joined the Education Commission of the OECD in Paris, serving as vice-president for two years. He saw a museum as having a place in the political life of a community and also placed great value on an evolving relationship between the museum and the public, placing the visitor at the center of its approach. He is known for innovating a collaborative style of museum management that favored producing exhibits under teams of professionals from widely disparate disciplines rather than relying curators on alone. He advocated for researchers, designers, educators, IT specialists, audiovisual specialists, lighting designers and graphic designers to join curators to produce exhibits. The museum, a combination of anthropology museum and history museum, still operates according to his vision.

In 1991 the Director of Musées de France asked him to develop a plan to revive the ailing National Museum of Folk Arts and Traditions in Paris. Though Arpin's ideas have proved popular with the public, his groundbreaking recommendations of reliance on researchers over curators were not followed. The museum ultimately failed, was moved to Marseille and entirely restructured.

Earlier that year, in February, Quebec's Minister of Cultural Affairs had assigned Arpin to chair the Groupe-conseil sur la politique culturelle du Québec, which developed a draft cultural policy for Quebec. Bourassa incorporated this into his cultural policy in 1992. However, aboriginal people complained that they had not heard about the plan in time to provide input. Other criticisms of Arpin's vision have surfaced, specifically from Isak Chiva, who felt that museums were focusing on theatre rather than leading in research. Nonetheless, Arpin's Museum of Civilization is credited as the model along which many other museums have been organized or restructured, including the Musée d'Orsay and the Musée du Quai Branly in Paris, Lyon's Musée des Confluences, Marseille's Musée des Civilizations de l'Europe et de la Méditerranée, the Musée d'histoire de l'Europe in Brussels and Cairo's National Museum of Egyptian Civilization.

Later career In 2001, Roland Arpin established the association that would organize the celebration of the 400th anniversary of Quebec City in 2008. He led it as the first president and general director until 2004 when changes in government at the federal, provincial and municipal level led him to retire at the age of 70. Arpin then said:

Questioned about his lasting work, the Museum of Civilization that he founded and directed in Quebec City, he concluded: Arpin died at the age of 76, on September 2, 2010, from Parkinson's disease.

Awards and honours 1988 – Award of Excellence for Career as Public Administrator, l'École nationale d'administration publique "National School of Public Administration" (ENAP and ADENAP) 1994 – Honorary Doctorate, National Institute of Scientific Research (INRS, University of Quebec) 1995 – Officer of Arts and Letters, of the French Republic 2001 – Member of the Académie des Grands Québécois 2002 – Honorary Doctorate of Letters, Université Laval Une Politique de la culture et des arts : proposition présentée à Liza Frulla-Hébert, ministre des Affaires culturelles du Québec Le Musée de la civilisation : concept et pratiques Des musées pour aujourd'hui Le Musée de la civilisation. Une histoire d'amour La Cité du 21e siècle. Le lieu de l’intelligence, Conférence, Journée thématique, Ville de Saint-Hyacinthe, le 30 mai 1998 La fonction politique des musées Le musée entre la fonction politique et l'action politique, collection Les grandes conférences, Ville Saint-Laurent, Fides, 1999, 44 p., 18 x 13 cm Groupe de travail sur la complémentarité du secteur privé dans la poursuite des objectifs fondamentaux du système de santé au Québec, présidé par M. Roland Arpin, 1999: La complémentarité du secteur privé dans la poursuite des objectifs fondamentaux du système public de santé au Québec : rapport du groupe de travail, 120 p. ; La présence du privé dans la santé au Québec : état détaillé de la situation, 48 p. ; Constats et recommandations sur les pistes à explorer : synthèse, 60 p. . Groupe-conseil sur la politique culturelle du Québec, sous la présidence de Roland Arpin, Notre patrimoine, un présent du passé, novembre 2000, XXX-240 p. Annexes (I : Curriculum vitæ des membres du Groupe-conseil ; II : Liste des organismes et des personnes rencontrées ; III : Bibliographie, Liste des documents reçus, Liste des documents consultés), photos, 17 tableaux Territoires culturels