In this article, we develop a framework that demonstrates how
older adults need to develop diverse capabilities in relation to
their educational life course through engagements in Nordic
museums, archives and street art activities. We discuss how
European museums have taken up UNESCO’s approach to lifelong
learning as a way to conceptualise activities for older adults’ in
museums, as we emphasise an approach to adult education for
active ageing articulated as ‘lifelong learning for active ageing’. To
illustrate this framing, we outline a number of activities taken
from publications, cultural sites and conferences in which we have
been involved over the last decade in the context of the Nordic
Centre of Heritage Learning and Creativity in Östersund, Sweden.
We argue that lifelong learning for active ageing in cultural heritage
institutions can contribute to the development of older
adults’ civic capabilities and needs to be seen as a prerequisite
for the development of older adults’ health capabilities.