Tutmania at the Ashmolean

I was very pleased to be able to pay a quick visit this weekend to the new 'Discovering Tutankhamun' exhibition at Oxford's Ashmolean museum, especially since (swanky showoff alert) I'd been invited to the preview event but not been able to go.

The really nice thing about the exhibition is that the focus, as the title suggests, is on the discovery, recording and analysis of the tomb rather than the bling that was recovered.  Admittedly this is slightly risky considering that the average tourist will have a very specific set of expectations when hearing the name 'Tutankhamun' - but this reaction is exactly what the exhibition plays upon so well.  Just how did this discovery lead to the creation of a worldwide phenomenon and a flood of interest in everything Egypt?  Why does the name have such international recognition ahead of Pharaohs such as Rameses II or Thutmose III?

The early rooms of the exhibition focus on Carter and his colleagues, and its nice to see that characters such as the photographer Harry Burton get as much attention as the more famous Carter.  I was particularly pleased as Burton is a native of Stamford, in Lincolnshire.  The photographs and drawings on show beautifully illustrate that posterity hasn't given the team anywhere near enough credit for their attempts to carefully and scientifically record their findings.  In particular, Carter's drawings show his skill as an artist and draughtsman, and the guache paintings of artefacts by Winifred Brunton are genuinely stunning artworks in their own right.

The exhibition moves on to examine the public reaction to the discovery and the emergence of 'Tutmania', through a series of displays focussing on music, fashion and music influenced, and attempting to cash in on, the find of the century.  Its an interesting subject, though perhaps a little too much of the exhibition space was taken up with this material for my taste.

One thing I did find very interesting was the display with letters received by Carter after the discovery.  Some were simply congratulatory, others seeking to buy the artefacts.  Sadly, even today some people seem unable to appreciate history unless they personally own a piece of it, as this letter from an Australian to Carter demonstrates:

"Please could you send me a souvenir from the tomb of King Tutankhamun.  I am intensely interested in history and would like very much like to see and handle a relic of ancient times.  I am enclosing a postal order to cover costs."

I sincerely hope the request was never acted on!

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8 stunning mummies at the British Museum

Cutting edge technology and archaeology go together extremely well these days, but it's fair to say that when it comes to museums, displays tend to be a little behind the curve for a whole host of reasons. The British Museum's 'Ancient Lives New Discoveries' exhibition, more commonly being referred to as '8 mummies', raises the bar substantially on a number of levels. It's also fair to say that it marks a spectacular return to form for our national flagship institution after the lukewarm reception to the Vikings.

The concept of the exhibition is simple. 8 Egyptian mummies from the BM's collections which have never before been unwrapped have been intensively studied through the use of non-destructive CT scanning, and the results of this analysis presented. The experience is therefore twofold - one is the story of the people themselves, the other a demonstration of the power of modern scientific investigation.

The ethics surrounding the storage and display of human remains are dealt with succinctly at the start of the exhibition, and I've heard that images of the displays are available at the ticketing desk for those unsure if the content will be suitable for them or their little ones. I'm pleased but not at all surprised that I didn't hear a word of objection to the display of the remains while in the gallery.

The individuals being highlighted cover a long period of time, and a variety of mummification processes, from a body naturally preserved in the desert in c.3500BC through the heydays of 'proper' mummification, some unusual practices from Roman Egypt and ending with a Christian Sudanese mummy dating to c.AD700.

Each mummy is presented in a clean, simple and respectful manner, with labels about the individual placed near to, but outside of the display case. This approach of not directly labelling an individual (as one might a an object such as a pot) proves to be a subtle but effective technique in retaining the humanity of the person and not reducing them to the status of 'museum object'. It's a good method and one that should be considered by any museum displaying human remains.

Close to each body is a large scale animation of the full CT scan, displayed on high quality screens. In most cases, as the body is unwrapped, this is the time that the actual person is revealed, hidden and huddled within their bindings. The animations cycle through the layers of the body, showing how the body relates to the outer casing and clearly demonstrating surviving organic matter such as organs, and various amulets and the like. Even the way the animations work is super slick - the fluidity of the layers appearing and disappearing means that it's easy to get mesmerised and watch a few complete cycles before turning away.

Alongside this are interactive versions of the CT scans. Using a very neat touch-operated wheel visitors can rotate or zoom in on the scan as appropriate to discover a certain feature for themselves.  What's particularly good about this is that the CT scans aren't something produced for the sake of the exhibition - they're the real thing, as used by the specialists and scientists. Having visitors engage with real material this way is a masterstroke, and evidence of how science doesn't need to be dumbed down for public consumption.

Alongside the body and the scans were cases of material illustrative of the life or occupation of that individual, but these also used technology to great effect, for example through the CT scans of the contents of a canopic jar and through 3D prints of body parts and amulets taken directly from the CT scans. This latter approach feels revolutionary in a museum context - not only can the existence of an object be identified through non-invasive scanning, but an exact replica can be created in 3D and placed in a display case next to it. We're definitely through the looking glass now, people!

The fact that the bodies haven't been unwrapped is of course wonderful for their future preservation, but more than that, it actually adds to the experience. Being able to see the digital version of the body in some way actually enhances the experience as the relationship between the body and it's 'container' is preserved. By comparison, having a body lying flat next to that container somehow wouldn't have the same impact. Not being able to see the body for real actually makes it feel more special and more of a privilege.

The final body on display has an unusual twist. The c.AD700 body of a woman from Sudan has a tattoo showing a monogram of St Michael. This unexpected survival (though sadly I failed to see it on the actual body) is a great story, as it was the rise of Christianity that brought an end to the practice of mummification. A suitable way to round off the journey indeed.

If I have the tiniest grumble, it was that sometimes the layout meant that the dividing lines between one mummy's accompanying material and the next were blurred, and a feeling of a new chapter opening with each new individual was diminished. As I said, though, it's an incredibly minor point.

Overall, the exhibition breaks new ground in the presentation of cutting edge scientific research to the public, but also in displaying human remains in a way that is respectful, personal and touching. Absolutely superb.

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Luxor graffiti and the great Chinese human flesh search

In recent years the Chinese internet has proved adept at naming and shaming those who have done wrong in the eyes of its many users.  People from politicians to cheating spouses, fraudsters and the tearaway children of millionaires have been 'outed' and identified through what is commonly known in China as 'human flesh searching' - using the mass of data freely available on the internet to find out a wrongdoer's identity and much more besides.

One recent incident has crossed into the worlds of archaeology and cultural tourism, and so particularly caught my attention.  A Chinese tourist called Shen was visiting the temple at Luxor in Egypt a few weeks ago and was appalled to see Chinese graffiti scrawled across one of the walls.  He posted a picture of the graffiti, which (with incredible wit and imagination) read 'Ding Jinhao was here' on his micro-blog and the machinery of the Chinese internet soon set to work to identify the culprit.

It turns out that Ding Jinhao is a 15 year old schoolboy from Nanjing who had carved his name for posterity some years earlier.  Now he has been named and shamed, it seems the pressure is getting to him.  His family has apologised on his behalf, promised that he has learned his lesson, and pleaded to now be left in peace.  Thankfully it seems like it will be possible to repair the damage caused to the wall, though it will of course never be as it was and should be irrelevant when discussing the severity of such mindless vandalism to historic monuments.

What is interesting is how the case has shed light again on the issue of Chinese tourists and how they behave.  Over the last few decades Chinese tourists have been flooding the globe, with wallets bulging enough to give them a warm welcome from many cash-strapped Western governments.  But of course having money is not an excuse for bad behaviour such as being noisy, messy and disrespectful of local customs and traditions.  Now, one excuse is that these Chinese tourists are quite newly rich and often travelling for the first time.  Even a basic knowledge of how other parts of the world live is often lacking, and travelling in large coach parties led by Chinese tour guides doesn't help them pick up any local customs or experience any meaningful contact with the residents of the places they visit.  Having said that, I think its pretty rich for Chinese tourists to be singled out in such a way.  Let's face it, we can all think of examples of British, American, French, Australian, Spanish, Italian or whatever tourists that make their more respectful countrymen wince with shame at their behaviour.  Being born in a western country and having traveled abroad before is certainly no guarantee of respectfulness, and I fear that Chinese tourists will soon have a reputation that they can't shake off but that most certainly don't deserve.

In fact, when it comes to graffiti, I'm pretty certain that I've seen more than my fair share of it on British historic sites, and not that much of it was written in Chinese.  In fact, some, like the example below from Croxden Abbey in Staffordshire, done by our far more respectful Victorian forebears...

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The Petrie Museum and old-school goodness

I don't like to do 'reviews' of museums because a) it makes me feel like a student again and b) I end up picking faults, which I hate doing as (any museum curator will tell you) all galleries are full of little foibles and errors that the curator wants to find time (or money) to put right. I'd never want to take the moral high ground and start pointing fingers at my fellow curators for any such glitches in their galleries.

But the museum I want to talk about is one that I am going to pick some faults with, because somehow they are exactly what make the place special - the Petrie Museum - which I managed to pop into on a recent visit to London.

The Petrie Museum is the UCL (University College London) museum of Egyptology, named for the great pioneering archaeologist Sir William Flinders Petrie whose excavations provided the museum with the bulk of its collections.

The displays are unashamedly old fashioned, and without wanting to insult anyone responsible for them, a little ramshackle. Objects can be found crammed into old wooden cases with barely a gap between them and turned at different angles on shelves that are too small. Labels are sometimes handwritten, sometimes entirely illegible as they are covered by objects or packaging and they are often wonky. Even when you can read them, the information is usually brief, technical, and of little use to the casual visitor.

 
Although these would often be fatal errors in a modern museum, in the Petrie they somehow seem to simply add to the atmosphere of a place which is packed full of wonderful treasures.  They portray a sense of charm and character - two of the hardest qualities for a museum to possess in my opinion.

The idea behind the labelling is of course to retain a sense of exploration - that feeling of the early archaeologists like Petrie making new discoveries and trying to understand and categorise their finds.  The museum actually feels like if you came back a month later, some exciting new find would have caused everything to be re-organised and re-interpreted.

So if you happen to be in London and looking for somewhere new to visit, head along to the Petrie Museum and revel in some unashamedly old fashioned, dusty shelved and vaguely eccentric museum loveliness.  After all, how can anyone fail to become fond of a museum that openly offers torches to visitors because the lighting isn’t very good?

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Old coins and dead Egyptians

It’s a funny old life being a museum curator.  I had a very long day in London the other day, getting up far too early to catch a train to get me to the British Museum for 9am.  The reason for this act of masochism was that I was attending a conference to celebrate the 150^th birthday of the department of coins and medals (though I didn’t even get them a card – I’m a terrible guest!)  I have to say that it was worth the effort, with some very good papers on the history of the department and some of the current projects being undertaken in the UK and abroad.  The updates on British projects such as the Portable Antiquities Scheme and the progress the BM is making on putting more of its collections online were particularly interesting.

One thing that did make me and a few provincial colleagues smile, though, was the way that some of the senior BM curators were criticising the lack of specialist numismatic posts in some museums, and highlighting how important it is that major research projects continue to be carried out.  It seemed to us that that view is slightly out of touch with the reality most museums are facing, when curators of huge collections and entire education and outreach departments are being culled en masse because of government cuts.  The luxury of specialist numismatic curators with the time and resources to carry out personal research projects is long gone, and the BM may do well to reflect how lucky they are to still have that role at all.

Having said that, it was a stimulating discussion, and I returned to Lincoln bursting with enthusiasm and ideas for new ways to get all of the people of Lincolnshire crazy about ancient coins.

While I was at the BM, I took the opportunity to go and see their latest exhibition – ‘Book of the Dead’.  Now, I have to confess that despite being a history buff, the Egyptians have always left me slightly cold – maybe it was the whole brain out of the nose thing when I was a kid?  Anyway, as a fully paid up, card carrying member of the Museums Association, I can get into the BM’s exhibitions for free, and I’m never one to pass up a freebie.

As I went round, I realised that the thoughts going round my head were the same as when I had visited the last few BM blockbuster exhibitions.  The objects are as wonderful as you’d expect them to be, the interpretation is informative and well planned and the dome of the reading room makes for a beautiful setting.  It should combine to make the perfect experience, but somehow it doesn’t.  The popularity of the exhibitions means that the visitor experience is poor.  For me, things like the large crowds in front of every case, being hit in the face by some tourist’s rucksack, having some screaming kid push past you the wrong way, or simply just having to stand and wait as you can’t even ignore a case and move on as the throng have created a bottleneck - all combine to just make me want to get through and out again as quickly as possible – and meaning that I take very little enjoyment or knowledge out of the experience.  I fail to see how anybody else could either.  It’s like an inverse ratio – as popularity increases, enjoyment for the individual visitor decreases.

I think a large part of the problem with this exhibition is that a lot of the objects are papyrus, meaning that you need to be close to them to get any sense of their detail.  The last BM exhibitions I really enjoyed were Hadrian and the Terracotta Warriors, and I think it’s no coincidence that they contained larger objects that could be appreciated from a distance.  If I could find a time to see this one when it was quiet, I’m sure I’d come away with a far better impression.

I actually went into ‘Book of the Dead’ twice.  My first visit was during lunchtime, but I tried again after the conference before my late train home, at about 7 o’clock in the hope it would be quieter.  It was actually worse – even more visitors and a child with some clacking toy that its parents evidently enjoyed the sound of.

Ultimately it’s hard to see how the BM can change it – getting lots of people to come to an exhibition is a sign of success, and lord knows the heritage industry in England at the moment needs every good bit of press it can get.  I just hope the hoards of other tourists didn’t feel as disappointed as I did, and will continue to come back again and again – if only they could keep away when I’m there…

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