Hello Museums!

A blog following my adventures in museums, archives, and other historical locations — Currently studying an Honours in Museum and Heritage Studies in Auckland, and volunteering part-time at the university's archive. Also volunteer at the fantastic New Zealand Cricket Museum during the summer.

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Treasures of New York: American Museum of Natural History

Currently watching this amazing documentary on the AMNH, and it’s reminding me of everything I love about museums. Getting to hear the staff talk about the history and the exhibits, their clear passion just fills me with joy.

Watching it for a small assignment for uni, and anyone who knows me is probably aware that I am doing my dissertation on the AMNH and its relationship with the film Night at the Museum. I’ve never actually been, so it is so great getting to see some of it, and makes me even more excited to finally visit in March.

If you are interested in the history of the AMNH or dioramas and taxidermy, I highly recommend giving this a watch, it’s really great.

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Highwic House Auckland

Had an amazing day out with some friends today visiting Hichwic, a historical house in Newmarket, Auckland. The house is beautiful and fun to explore. They have a special wedding dress display throughout the house right now which was also really cool.

Got a great history from the volunteer at the counter today. The family who built the house in the 1862 had a staggering 21 children and had to expend the original cottage by two wings to fit them all. The gardens are also lovely, I loved the Fernary.

http://www.heritage.org.nz/places/places-to-visit/auckland-region/highwic

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Photos for Finding Rose Blog Taken on Thursday 8 June, 2017

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I’ve been getting behind on posting, what with the end of semester slog.

A few week ago I have the absolute pleasure of visiting the Auckland War Memorial Museum with my class on Māori and Indigenous engagement with Museums. We were lucky enough to get to go out the back of the Te Awe project space, where the museum’s Māori collection is housed (VERY beautifully might I add, it was heaven for a collections nerd like me), and the Pacific Collection Access Project (PCAP).

What made the Māori collection space so amazing was the care taken to individually house each carving and items in a secure and respectful way. Since it was reorganised, the space as been set up so that the carvings downstairs are grouped by iwi group, and even relationships between iwi are taking into account. This has the benefit of not only grouping the carving styles, but also making it easier to for visiting groups to locate their taonga. While there, out lecture was able to identify a number of items from her iwi she had not known were there. Then upstairs other items are stored in compacting roller shelves and draws, individually nested. I really fell in love with the space.

I wasn’t able to get photos for most of it sadly, but I did get permission to share some photos of the photography space out the back of PCAP, which was pretty awesome. This is where the museum is digitising its collection for public access. As we were finishing up, they brought in an amazing wedding dress made of a soldier’s parachute he smuggled back to his wife. My friend got to help out with its cleaning and restoration.

If you visit the museum you can see into both of these project spaces through viewing windows. At least for the moment, and I recomend you do.

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Thought you guys might be interested in seeing the progress of the demolition of the Maidment Theatre.

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Gus Fisher Gallery 27 Shortland Street, Auckland

Today’s class fieldtrip was to the University’s Gus Fisher Gallery. We had the pleasure to go down to the storeroom and talk with Linda Taylor and Richard Wolfe. As you can see from the photos the shelves are pretty sparse. This is because the gallery’s works are part of a Distributed Collection, meaning the collection is distributed through the university campuses and building or otherwise on loan to other institutions.

The cabinet seen in the photos contains works by past Elam Art School students. The piece on top is by Richard Wolfe. Other items that can be found on the shelves are photographs and digital copies of visual art.

Because I’m a massive nerd, my favourite thing was a collection of small old name plaques. They were engraved and I spent the entire time down there touching the words. It was wonderful. If you're curious, the piece I had says Nihoniho which is Māori, and appears to mean ‘to be antagonistic or cantankerous’. I have no idea what it was a sign for.

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Greetings from Auckland and the UOA Archive At the beginning of the year I moved back to Auckland to take a second crack at my Honours degree. So far so good! Two A-'s under my belt, just need to up my game to keep my A average and I can hopefully nab a sexy scholarship for my Masters degree ;D I was lucky enough to have a course timetable that allows me to put aside a day a week to volunteer, and luckier still to be taken up by the University of Auckland's Archive to help process new objects into the collection. At the moment I am working through 16 boxes of documents from the university's Maidment Theatre, which is sadly being demolished currently. It's pretty darn interesting! While some of the boxes are less exciting (eftpos receipts and banking documentation), there are also years of bookings for productions held at the theatre, as well as programmes, posters, postcards, and all sorts of printed ephemera from productions related to the theatre. And if you know me, printed ephemera and old documents are kind of my jam.

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What an excellent day for T20 cricket! The sun really turned out for us at the Basin Reserve today. We’ve got the elimination game of the Georgie Pie Super Smash going on, Wellington Firebirds v. Canterbury Kings. Winner plays Central Districts in the final on Saturday.

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Cap: Joy Lamason - NZ Women's Cricketer 1948-1958

A Baggy style cricket cap owned by New Zealand women's cricketer Joy Lamason. This cap was presented to Lamason for her New Zealand team debut in 1948. Cricket caps are ceremonially presented to First-Class and Test cricketers prior to their debut.

The cap is made of black wool, featuring a white silver fern embroidered on the front. The colour is typical for New Zealand cricketers. Colours can vary between countries, Australian caps for example are a green. It is un-elasticated, with a low back and flat, low-angled brim. It is well constructed, and well cared for, which is to be expected of such a personal item.

Cap size 6 3/4.

Given to fellow New Zealand Women's cricketer Trish McKelvey, who later donated it to the New Zealand Cricket Museum. 

1. ESPN Cricinfo 2. Cricket Wellington

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At the moment I am working through a collection of objects donated by New Zealand cricketer Trish McKelvey. This is a mixture of gear, photos, and memorabilia owned by herself and the late (great) New Zealand Cricketer Joy Lamason.

These are all great objects, and add to the rich, but sadly limited, history of Women’s Cricket in New Zealand.

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New Zealand Cricket Museum Basin Reserve, Wellington

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Basin Reserve Cricket Ground Wellington, New Zealand Taken from in front of the New Zealand Cricket Museum.