Photo Friday: Outside the Museum

I stepped outside on Tuesday afternoon to get some air and see daylight (occupational hazard of working with collections? Basement or windowless office.). The daylight was exceptionally beautiful - sun from the west, clouds in the east. So I ran back to my office, grabbed the camera and snapped a few photos before the light disappeared.

Photo Friday: Polar Bear Pendant

I skipped ahead out of the lithics this week and took pictures of some of our smaller Arctic type objects. This piece, a carved polar bear head pendant, was probably carved for sale. It's grouped with three other carved for sale type pieces including a napkin ring, a letter opener, and a small seal. I love the heads flanking it on the right and left. Seals, maybe? And also the tongue detail - very red and interesting!

Photo Friday: Mortar/Bowl

The major collections projects at the moment are somewhat less photogenic than the process of packing and moving were.

We're doing an inventory. Moving and unpacking was a group effort which involved many people, and sometimes lines of communication get crossed. Right now we're working to make sure that everything is where it ought to be and that our database reflects that.

At the same time, we're using our new Nikon camera to take high quality photos of the collection. We're starting with our mortars and pestles and moving on to the natural history collection. Here's a photo of a bowl or mortar made of volcanic rock:

This piece was collected in Idaho. According to its catalog record, the donor "worked on it" suggesting that he modified it in some way from how he found it. But what precisely was done is hard to tell. It may have been a chunk of volcanic rock, completely unformed, or it may have had the suggestion of a bowl. Another mystery to speculate on.