I found this interesting article during last week which made me stop and think, like a pebble in the road I wanted to have a closer look at. Its an apron exhibition at the Vandergrift Museum in the US. All the aprons were sourced from people who lived or had lived in the Vandergrift area and it was great that not all of them were domestic aprons. There was an anatomy and Dairy Queen apron, and a Christmas apron. The aspect of the exhibition I liked the most was that the exhibition wasn't just about the aprons and the technical side to their creation, it was predominantly about the stories behind them, the interpretation.
Bringing together what seems to be an ordinary, everyday object can start people talking about so many different things - for example the changing to domestic life and the role of women, arts and crafts skills, changes in clothes; just to name a few of the more obvious ones.
The interpretation of objects is the important aspect of having a collection of objects, without it the objects are meaningless and storerooms would resemble junkrooms.
Very well put, Alethea! When I worked at a museum in Melbourne we would often have people wanting to donate objects, but unfortunately they didn't have any kind of story or information about them!
ReplyDeleteThe problem with this is that the general public viewing the objects have no connection to them unless they know the provenance and back story to the objects.
Who wants to see this: Jar, 18th century.
When you can see something like this: Jar, 18th century, used to collect honey from wild bees in the south of France. Honey collectors would do so without safety equipment, often experiencing up to 20 bee stings per collection etc. etc.
(I just made that up, but you get what I'm saying) :P
nice hypothetical example Saire :-)
ReplyDeleteThe only thing about some objects is the provenance needs to be checked. Such as if someone had an object supposedly from, or in some way related to, someone famous. But I guess in the context we're talking about that would rarely happen.
I agree with the whole keeping things locked away side of it too. I know there is a role for preservation, but if no-one actually has access to the material - is there any point in preserving it. It provides more meaning if they can access it and the story around it - even if this is in an alternative format - such as a digital picture and not the original object being preserved.
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