Over the last few weeks the team has been busy preparing 23
of the ‘Small Blessings’ amulets for display in the Museum. After selecting a
handful of amulets from the thousands in the collection, I set about the task
of writing display labels for them. The labels tell visitors a little bit about
where each amulet is from and what it was used for – a first glimpse of the
stories that will be available on the final project website, which we will be
launching this summer.
Each of the objects was catalogued by Alice and Rosanna,
photographed by Malcolm, and checked for display by Jenny. Alice and Rosanna
ensured that each object had been numbered and that its location had been
updated on the database, and Jenny whisked one of the snails away to the
freezer as it was showing signs of pest damage that might have endangered the
other objects.
Ady, one of the Museum technicians, made a mock-up of the
display so that we could decide where to place all of the objects and labels
and see how the case would look. All this advanced planning meant that when
everything was finally ready we could install the display with minimal
disruption to the Museum.
Although the ‘Small Blessings’ display is only a small, temporary installation, preparing it involved a whole team of people. We hope you will be able to come to the Museum and take a look at these intriguing objects – you can find them in the Upper Gallery.
On display are: a policeman’s amulet, an ex-voto, a wolf’s tooth, a faith, hope and charity charm, two reliquaries, two Loreto bells, three horned hands, three Eiffel Tower mascots, four snails in linen bags, and five death’s head amulets.
Charlotte
