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Workshop 2: Object Lives – marks on objects
4th Sep, 2007 to 4th Dec, 2007
ACCES Cementation Workshop 2 Hosted by Birmingham Museum Time: 13:00-1600 October 30th 2007
ACCES cementation workshop 2. Topic: Object Lives – marks on objects
Date: October 30th
Venue: MCC Birmingham
Schedule:
11.00-12.00 option of tour of storage facility with curator
12.00-1.00 lunch
1.00-2.15 Marks on Objects:
1.00 Stephen Quirke: excavation keys - the Tony Arkell 1940s guide to marks
1.15 Helen Whitehouse: case-studies from the Ashmolean and elsewhere
1.45 Phil Watson: examples of marked objects as clues to object biographies
2.15-2.45 tea
2.45-4.00 round table discussion - shared problems, sharing resources
Object biography is an area of equal interest to curators and historians of collections and to archaeologists. Less recognition has been given to the virtual networks created by common histories of objects across collections, and waiting to be activated nationwide and internationally. Between one and two hundred museums participated in the distribution of artefacts from excavations in Egypt and Sudan from the 1880s to the 1980s, on top of the frequent additions to museum collections of 19th- and early 20th-century acquisitions with significant travel or collecting histories. All of these acquisition histories can pose problems for detailed recording at a later date. Usually undated, ink and pencil on objects and old labels can help unlock to ancient as well as modern object lives, but require local combinations of specific archaeological and historical knowledge.
This practical workshop is hosted by Phil Watson, curator at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. From her experience as curator at the Ashmolean Museum and visits to other collections, Helen Whitehouse presents examples of the problems and opportunities that arise with marks on objects. Stephen Quirke introduces a postwar self-help index compiled by the then curator Tony Arkell during the unpacking of the 805 crates of part-labelled objects stored away from London during the war.
IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO ATTEND THIS WORKSHOP, PLEASE E-MAIL STEPHEN QUIRKE BY RETURN ON s.quirke@ucl.ac.uk
To download the report of the last workshop click here:
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Exposing_Objects_Workshop |
