Thursday, March 15, 2007
"He Gave His Life For Tourism..."
This week my husband, kids and I went to see Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of Pharaohs at the Franklin Institute. I had also seen "King Tut" back in 1977 when it toured the US, I had loved it and as an aspiring archaeologist at the time it was a very special thing for me, made more special by the ends my mom went to in working it's Chicago showing into our college visiting trip. So it was a priority for me to share it with my kids.
It didn't get the greatest of reviews and I had talked to a number of friends who were a bit disappointed. Having gone to the show I can better understand that but feel that it is more a function of over hyped or misleading publicity and a lack of clear pre understanding of what is and or isn' t in the exhibit then anything to do with the exhibit itself.
You are led to believe or at least not disabused of believing that you will see A Lot of really cool really Big and spectacular Tut stuff. In fact at least half the exhibit is taken up with historical context and lovely artifacts from his great grandparents, grandparents and parents. I appreciated and enjoyed both these objects and the context. But hey I am a geeky archaeologist and a museum professional to boot so I skew the sample. It would have been nice if somewhere, other then just in the exhibit catalogs the exhibition writers had explained why some of the bigger pieces were not included (for their safety and to safe guard from wear and tear) and to perhaps have included some life size pics of them for context.
I am glad we went, even though I was sick. It was a blast to share it with the kids. Andrew kept getting bored and even the stand by of find which object in this room is your favorite started to wear thin. But if the number of times he came to drag me from what I was looking at to see something he liked or remembered from when we studied Egypt last year where any indication he actually did like it. Vicky seemed to be soaking it up. She was looking at it with her artists eye while I looked at it with my archaeologist eye and criticized or admired display and lighting.
One of my favorite things was the last room where they had a raised platform with a changing display of catscan slices of the mummy with photo overlays of some of the object found on the body which were also displayed in the room. the floor surrounding the platform had concentric rectangles of brass showing the location of the many sarcophagi that encased the mummy.
If you go I recommend an early weekday trip, it was very uncrowded then which made for more relaxed viewing, especially with the kids.
If you don't recognize the blog title you are too young and should check this out classic SNL piece by Steve Martin.
It didn't get the greatest of reviews and I had talked to a number of friends who were a bit disappointed. Having gone to the show I can better understand that but feel that it is more a function of over hyped or misleading publicity and a lack of clear pre understanding of what is and or isn' t in the exhibit then anything to do with the exhibit itself.
You are led to believe or at least not disabused of believing that you will see A Lot of really cool really Big and spectacular Tut stuff. In fact at least half the exhibit is taken up with historical context and lovely artifacts from his great grandparents, grandparents and parents. I appreciated and enjoyed both these objects and the context. But hey I am a geeky archaeologist and a museum professional to boot so I skew the sample. It would have been nice if somewhere, other then just in the exhibit catalogs the exhibition writers had explained why some of the bigger pieces were not included (for their safety and to safe guard from wear and tear) and to perhaps have included some life size pics of them for context.
I am glad we went, even though I was sick. It was a blast to share it with the kids. Andrew kept getting bored and even the stand by of find which object in this room is your favorite started to wear thin. But if the number of times he came to drag me from what I was looking at to see something he liked or remembered from when we studied Egypt last year where any indication he actually did like it. Vicky seemed to be soaking it up. She was looking at it with her artists eye while I looked at it with my archaeologist eye and criticized or admired display and lighting.
One of my favorite things was the last room where they had a raised platform with a changing display of catscan slices of the mummy with photo overlays of some of the object found on the body which were also displayed in the room. the floor surrounding the platform had concentric rectangles of brass showing the location of the many sarcophagi that encased the mummy.
If you go I recommend an early weekday trip, it was very uncrowded then which made for more relaxed viewing, especially with the kids.
If you don't recognize the blog title you are too young and should check this out classic SNL piece by Steve Martin.
