Object in Focus: Project Progress (Sarah Abdolattif Elsheekh, ITP 2018, Sudan)
My name is Sarah Abdolattif Elsheekh Mohammed Elbasheer, Curator from the Sudan National Museum.
Our object, the Hunt Krater
My Object in Focus partner Yohana Frias (ITP 2018, Philippines) and I chose the Hamilton Vase, or ‘Hunt Krater’ from the British Museum’s Greek and Roman Department for our Object in Focus exhibition project proposal. This krater, used for mixing wine with water, dates from around 575-550 BC and was made in Corinth, Greece but found in Italy.
British Museum label for our object
Choosing a museum object from a different culture, not your own, and then presenting it creatively is a real challenge as you must dive deeper into research.
After choosing the object, we had a very interesting presentation from Miriam Lloyd-Evans (independent curator), which my ITP colleague Mariana Sainz from Mexico also wrote about on the ITP blog. The presentation inspired our creative thinking about which journey our object should take. We had several journey ideas during this workshop session: religious journeys, symbolic, cultural, physical…
Next we went to see the object in the Greek and Roman galleries to observe it in person and take some photos. Afterwards we went to the Greek and Roman Department and talked to the curators there about the object and did some more research.
Yohana and I chose to tell the story of our object’s ‘journey of influence’.
At first I felt some anxiety about working on this project but when we started to work together, I found my partner Yohana very nice, very smart and innovative. She is also very patient and skillful with computer work. I am really lucky!
Our last exercise before leaving to our UK partner museums was to sit down and start writing our label and panel. Ian Jenkins, curator in the Greece and Rome Department, was very helpful during this part. We also talked to him about the display of the object and what other things/programmes we could have with it.
Finally, during my observation of my colleagues working on the Object in Focus project, I noticed great harmony between them and full coordination. This project brings people closer together!
Sarah
Deep thanks for your help and support to Amalia Kakissis, Cherry Thinn and Jessica Juckes