Have you ever imagined a museum where the collection is changing constantly? That the collection can engage in dialogue and dynamic exchange with the audience and exploring new ideas, that the audience's participation also reinterprets the collection? ⋯It sounds farcical, yet it may be the easiest way to understand the spirit of the "eco-museum" of Daxi Wood Art Ecomuseum.

On March 28, 2015, the Daxi Wood Art Ecomuseum opened its doors to the public. The campaign poster was themed, "Daxi, the Birth of Our Museum," to fully illustrate the relationship between the Daxi Wood Art Ecomuseum and local residents. Furthermore, a purposefully designed map of the entire museum area brought together the precious resources preserved in Daxi’s landscape through centuries of development. The map shows the travel of the Dahan River, the mother river of Daxi, as well as the streets and buildings in the old city, and the humanities that thronged the three-layer river terrace. When Museum opened in 2015, the only two buildings restored and opened were Hall No.1 and the Martial Arts Dojo (Wude Hall), nonetheless, it still attracted slews of locals to study the map, and envision how the streets and landscapes of Daxi can be linked in the future. In so doing, it makes the whole of Daxi as a spatial community to be historically rewritten by the people of Daxi. This is how "WE" was chosen as the spirit of the Wood Art Ecomuseum.

The creation of the Daxi Wood Art Ecomuseum was formed through a bottom-up initiative with the locals. The ecomuseums originated in France, and the original founding precepts were quite complicated, with application challenges in the operation model. Taiwanese museologist Prof.Li-Cheng Lu once pointed out that "Since the ecomuseums originated in France have not been successfully developed into a widely accepted museum type (M eseum type) after years of practice, one might as well consider ecomuseums as a way of thinking.”

The fundamental functions of a museum are generally defined as collection, research, exhibition, education and promotion, as well as public services and social connections, which have drawn more attention in recent years. Director Chen of the Wood Art Ecomuseum noted that the humanities, the natural environment, and the lifestyles derived from them are the "living collections " of a museum. Under this premise, what are the functions of the Wood Art Ecomuseum in Daxi?

First of all, the "cultural sites" are shaped as the foundation of Daxi’s museum experience: the town's architectural clusters spanning the Qing Dynasty, Japanese colonial rule, and contemporary history are restored, organized, and opened, and they themselves encapsulate the development of the town and bear witness to traces of Taiwan's history in the town. The historic residences, Japanese-style dormitories, and modern public buildings and civic spaces left behind during the Japanese colonial period are transformed into different themed exhibits at the Wood Art Ecomuseum, and the cultural venues are established with the goal to foster a learning space for local knowledge, publicness, and public service.

The value of a museum is not limited to the space and its collections; rather, the sharable knowledge to be passed on is what makes museum as an establishment unique. For a museum that operates with an "ecomuseum" mindset, "residents" and "local life" are not just objects for "collecting" knowledge and stories, but rather, they are living organisms that actively participate in the experience with their own interpretations. The so-called self-interpretation is not only about telling stories and adding multiple perspectives to things, but also about the possession of a strong initiative in transmission, promotion, translation, and innovation.

Therefore, the second key strategy is to continue to cultivate and empower talents, connect communities to strengthen their sense of being part of the museum community. In addition to administrative work, museum staff are volunteers, residents, and community members who participate in the operations of the museum, so that more and more people can identify with the place through the perspective of the museum, and act concertedly with the museum to change the place for the better.

Finally, from creating public cultural spaces to supporting museum staff in urban museums, ecomuseums also need to develop diverse action plans to address different topics and issues. It does this by leveraging conventional museum methods (collection, research, display, and educational outreach) to transfer knowledge to the public and to accumulate more knowledge at the same time. Examples of this include the "Corner House Project" (Note 1), the wood art industry culture in Daxi, and the preservation and promotion of festival and celebrations culture are just some of the action plans.

Note 1: " Corner House " are spaces supported by the resources of the Wood Art Ecomuseum to integrate private spaces in the townscape into cultural sites; there’s an emphasis on the operators of the streetcorner museums being able to think from a museum perspective, and develop cultural sites with their own characteristics that integrate local life and public services. Over the past few years, the number of streetcorner museums in Daxi has grown steadily, and the locations are networked to form a cultural community. These spatial areas are the extension and manifestation of the concept of the Wood Art Ecomuseum.