This month, the Chau Chak Wing Museum team has been working hard to create digital content to share with you. Some initiatives you will find below, others are to come soon. We hope you'll listen to our new podcast, participate in our creative challenge and enjoy reading Issue 25 of Muse Magazine. Meanwhile the construction of our new museum nears completion and we will soon begin moving in!
New podcast: episode 1 out nowHosted by Dr Craig Barker, Object Matters explores our cross-disciplinary collections one object at a time. Coming soon to Apple Podcasts, you can listen now on our website, Spotify, Stitcher and most other podcast apps!
Creative ChallengeJoin our all-ages isolation art challenge and respond creatively to some of our favourite collection items.
New issue of Muse
out nowThe transformation of a Dutch painting and the curious tale of two lighthouses are among the many stories in the latest issue of Muse Magazine.
Online learning hub coming soonThis month we will be launching our online learning hub, featuring education activities for primary and secondary school students. Stay tuned!
Sydney Alumni Magazine (SAM) explores our use of the latest archaeological technologies in our mummy research.
NEAF Lecture:
Cleopatra’s Island
Join Dr Craig Barker via Zoom for the next Near Eastern Archaeology Foundation lecture.
27 May, 6.30 pm
UMAC 2020 cancelled
The UMAC Board has reluctantly decided to cancel the UMAC 2020 conference in light of the uncertainties around events and travel worldwide.
Farewell Dr Jamie Fraser
Last month we farewelled Jamie, as he departed for his new role at the British Museum, Curator: Ancient Levant and Anatolia. Jamie Fraser was Senior Curator of the Nicholson Collection 2017-2020 and among his many achievements initiated an impressive research program on the Nicholson Egypt collections, detailed above. We would like to thank Jamie for the ambition and energy he brought to our team.
Collection item of the month
How's your iso-baking game? Are you keeping a sourdough starter alive on your kitchen bench? If you too have succumbed to some form of comfort baking, you may be interested to discover that we have an ancient loaf of bread in our Nicholson Collection! Thousands of years old, the loaf was likely an offering, left outside a tomb to feed the deceased in the afterlife. Fruit, eggs, beer and bread were often left for the dead by a priest or family member. In the banner at the top of this newsletter you can also see wheat grains from Tutankhamun's tomb, collected by University of Sydney alumnus and Egyptologist Sir Grafton Elliot
Smith in the 1920s. Collection item: Cake of bread, collected in Egypt, Donated by Sir Charles Nicholson 1860.
Image details (in order of appearance)
1. Banner image: 55 wheat grains, 1550-1295BC, Tutankhamun's tomb, Egypt. Donated by Mrs Elwyn M Andrews and Miss Elizabeth C Bootle in memory of their great-uncle Sir Grafton Elliot Smith, 1984.
2. Object Matters podcast artwork.
3. JW Power, Untitled (Still life with toothbrush), circa 1930. Oil on canvas. Mrs Edith Power Bequest 1961.
4. Muse Magazine, Issue 25.
5. School children in an object-based learning lesson.
6. A computer tomography (CT) scan of the contents of the coffin of Mer-Neith-it-es. Created by Macquarie Medical Imaging.
7. The coffin lid of Mer-Neith-it-es, as viewed through the DStretch (decorrelation stretching) process. Image by B Drabsch & A Howells, University of Newcastle.
8. Tombs of the Kings at Paphos, image courtesy NEAF.
9. Artist's impression Chau Chak Wing Museum.
10. Former Senior Curator Nicholson Collection, Dr James Fraser.
11. Cake of bread, collected in Egypt, Donated by Sir Charles Nicholson 1860.
|