It's a quiet week here - I'm spending a lot of time processing digital photos for the database. We're also making headway in designing an actual website for the museum. This isn't an official date, but we're hoping to get it online by late August.
In the meantime, I keep up with museum news and blogs while I eat lunch, and two items caught my eye today.
More of the "crystal skulls" are forgeries. There was a big hullabaloo right about the time that Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released over one of the famous crystal skulls being fake. The revelation that it was a forgery prompted other institutions with crystal skulls to begin close investigation. And this article reveals that the skulls in the British Museum and the Smithsonian both have evidence of modern manufacture. Sorry, Indy.
The Brooklyn Museum is reflooring its Court. Way more interesting than it sounds. This blog post from the Brooklyn Museum shows how they are saving and re-creating a very cool glass floor in their popular Court. Lots of neat images of original floorplans and the undertaking to save the floor. Check it out!
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Monday, July 7, 2008
Back to work!
Here in the US, we're coming back to work after a long weekend. I've got a list of projects to tackle this week which include processing some objects which had not been cataloged or photographed, some database cleanup, and some filing. In the meantime, here are some photos of the new building, coming along nicely. I may have mentioned this, but the museum will not be occupying the entire building; instead, it will have a nice suite of spaces on the first floor. The Anthropology and Geography departments will make up much of the upper floors.
As always, click through for larger images.
The addition to the front of the building is coming along very nicely.
The bottom floor walls have been put up.
It's quite a dry region here; you can see what the grass would look like if it wasn't watered regularly (most of the campus is).
As always, click through for larger images.
The addition to the front of the building is coming along very nicely.
The bottom floor walls have been put up.
It's quite a dry region here; you can see what the grass would look like if it wasn't watered regularly (most of the campus is).
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Whatzit Answer: 6/20/2008
Whoops! I didn't mean Thursday when I told you that the answer to last week's Whatzit would be revealed early this week.
There were two excellent guesses as to what this strange contraption might be: A clothes drier or wringer, or a paper or cardboard crimper. Both are close in their own way: This contraption is a fluting iron.
A fluting iron was used to put crimps, pleats, or ruffles into petticoats in days of yore. So it has both to do with laundry and crimping - half points to both guessers. Most fluting irons were not so fancy as this hand crank model - they usually had a ridged base and a ridged curved handheld top part. This particular fluting iron is from right here in Ellensburg, WA and is part of the oldest and most diverse collection in the museum. It's exact history is not known, but one can easily imagine the pioneer families of the Kittitas Valley ordering a fluting iron from the city to bring a little bit of luxury to their lives.
You can see many kinds of historic irons in North Dakota State University's Emily P. Reynolds Historic Costume Collection.
There were two excellent guesses as to what this strange contraption might be: A clothes drier or wringer, or a paper or cardboard crimper. Both are close in their own way: This contraption is a fluting iron.
A fluting iron was used to put crimps, pleats, or ruffles into petticoats in days of yore. So it has both to do with laundry and crimping - half points to both guessers. Most fluting irons were not so fancy as this hand crank model - they usually had a ridged base and a ridged curved handheld top part. This particular fluting iron is from right here in Ellensburg, WA and is part of the oldest and most diverse collection in the museum. It's exact history is not known, but one can easily imagine the pioneer families of the Kittitas Valley ordering a fluting iron from the city to bring a little bit of luxury to their lives.
You can see many kinds of historic irons in North Dakota State University's Emily P. Reynolds Historic Costume Collection.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Science Friday!
I listen to NPR here at work quite a bit. Right now it's Talk of the Nation Science Friday, one of my favorite shows. There are two gentlemen from the Getty Conservation Institute discussing art conservation and the agents of deterioration. Should be quite interesting.
Podcasts are available, and this segment is running at the beginning of the second hour. Check it out if you want to learn more about preserving and conserving from some very experienced folks.
Podcasts are available, and this segment is running at the beginning of the second hour. Check it out if you want to learn more about preserving and conserving from some very experienced folks.
June 20, 2008 - Whatzit?
Oh boy have I got a good whatzit for you today! At least I think so. Check it out (click to view larger version):
It's metal, you can turn the hand crank which causes the two rollers to turn, and it's a pretty sturdy little machine. There's a small tab in front that can move back and forth adjusting... something.
From the back:
There are a few more photos, including of the text on the object, in our Flickr stream. Take a look at them, then come back here and give me your best guess on this mystery machine. All will be revealed early next week.
It's metal, you can turn the hand crank which causes the two rollers to turn, and it's a pretty sturdy little machine. There's a small tab in front that can move back and forth adjusting... something.
From the back:
There are a few more photos, including of the text on the object, in our Flickr stream. Take a look at them, then come back here and give me your best guess on this mystery machine. All will be revealed early next week.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Summer Daze
I've been doing computer work for the past couple days and my eyes hurt from staring at the screen. But it's all for a good cause. Projects underway include making a list of objects we have records for but no recent inventory of, figuring out how many chipped stone pieces we have (answer: about 6500), cleaning up the database, and some good old data entry.
I'm off to give my eyes a rest and work on a couple of issues that cropped up during the chipped stone count. I leave for you a completely unrelated image of small carved whale toggles - photographed and cataloged in 2007.
I'll be back tomorrow with the first Whatzit of summer!
I'm off to give my eyes a rest and work on a couple of issues that cropped up during the chipped stone count. I leave for you a completely unrelated image of small carved whale toggles - photographed and cataloged in 2007.
I'll be back tomorrow with the first Whatzit of summer!
Monday, June 9, 2008
School's out!
"Intellectual control" is a huge concept in museums. It's not to be confused with intellectual property which also happens to be very important. Intellectual control means that a museum can account for its objects, their history, their ownership, and so on and so forth. It's knowing where objects came from and where they are and if they should stay where they are. (By the way, if there are museum professionals out there with a better definition of intellectual control, please share.)
When I came to this museum, I was happy to find that a good level of intellectual control had been established over most of the collection - most objects have numbers which relate them to donors, and the database allows most objects to be easily located.
But nothing's perfect. There are several boxes of rocks, like the one above, mostly geologic specimens and fossil leaf impressions, which have escaped cataloging for the most part. Over the past week or so, I've been working in one of the store rooms beginning to sort out these specimens. I've set up a mobile command center at which I can sit and listen to my local NPR news station while I catalog, measure, and photograph these objects.
I'll be honest; these rocks are a challenge. Many of them have duplicate numbers. That is, they have the same catalog number as a different sort of object entirely. Some of them were labeled with a number on a sticker and the sticker has fallen off. It's my task to figure out how to identify these objects in our records. Before I make that decision, I am determining the extent of the duplicate issue. The two primary options that I see at this time are to 1) add a letter after the catalog number (duplicate 8-57 might become 8-57G (G for geology?)), or 2) assign new numbers which would come after the last catalog number for the accession. Both seem plausible. Option 2 seems reasonable given that most of the labels are not applied directly - they're on stickers which are falling off already.
No matter what I ultimately decide to do (and I am open to opinions and alternatives), I am going to document the heck out of it. Part of intellectual control is knowing the history of the object to the greatest extent possible. So if 8-57 is reassigned the number 8-514, for example, I would record that on both the paper catalog card which exists, and in our PastPerfect database. This way future collections managers will be able to avoid potential confusion.
On the flip side of the duplicate number issue is the missing objects issue. Going through these boxes have revealed many objects which were earlier unrecorded in the database and had been presumed missing. So for these objects, it's a happy ending straight away!
When I came to this museum, I was happy to find that a good level of intellectual control had been established over most of the collection - most objects have numbers which relate them to donors, and the database allows most objects to be easily located.
But nothing's perfect. There are several boxes of rocks, like the one above, mostly geologic specimens and fossil leaf impressions, which have escaped cataloging for the most part. Over the past week or so, I've been working in one of the store rooms beginning to sort out these specimens. I've set up a mobile command center at which I can sit and listen to my local NPR news station while I catalog, measure, and photograph these objects.
I'll be honest; these rocks are a challenge. Many of them have duplicate numbers. That is, they have the same catalog number as a different sort of object entirely. Some of them were labeled with a number on a sticker and the sticker has fallen off. It's my task to figure out how to identify these objects in our records. Before I make that decision, I am determining the extent of the duplicate issue. The two primary options that I see at this time are to 1) add a letter after the catalog number (duplicate 8-57 might become 8-57G (G for geology?)), or 2) assign new numbers which would come after the last catalog number for the accession. Both seem plausible. Option 2 seems reasonable given that most of the labels are not applied directly - they're on stickers which are falling off already.
No matter what I ultimately decide to do (and I am open to opinions and alternatives), I am going to document the heck out of it. Part of intellectual control is knowing the history of the object to the greatest extent possible. So if 8-57 is reassigned the number 8-514, for example, I would record that on both the paper catalog card which exists, and in our PastPerfect database. This way future collections managers will be able to avoid potential confusion.
On the flip side of the duplicate number issue is the missing objects issue. Going through these boxes have revealed many objects which were earlier unrecorded in the database and had been presumed missing. So for these objects, it's a happy ending straight away!
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