Science Museum Research Articles

Why the anonymous and everyday objects are important: using the Science Museum’s collections to re-write the history of vision aids

The history of nineteenth-century spectacles and eyeglasses is unusual in the extent to which it has incorporated objects and material evidence. However, both collectors and historians have favoured the pristine object or the object with noteworthy providence at the expense of more utilitarian frames. By drawing upon my experience as a Collaborative Doctoral Partnership (CDP) student at the Science Museum, this article reflects on how large anonymous and primarily uncatalogued collections can be fruitfully used in historical research. By case-studying the retail and design of vision aids, it argues that everyday or anonymous objects – the broken, scratched, un-named – are a valuable historical source. It highlights the usefulness of material culture for exploring the experiences of use or of users that otherwise leave little trace and proposes how problems of interpretation can be overcome through the study of a range of additional sources: business records, trade catalogues, advertising material, imagery, popular literature and medical literature. Whilst researching an anonymous collection is labour-intensive, the material evidence of utilitarian and noteworthy spectacles and eyeglasses allowed the experience of nineteenth-century vision aid wear and vision testing to be fully explored and communicated to both an academic and non-academic audience.

Ventriloquised voices: the Science Museum and the Hartree Differential Analyser

This article builds on previous literature on museums and material culture by presenting an examination of the changing stories that a particular object — a rebuilt version of Douglas Hartree’s Differential Analyser — has been used to tell in the Science Museum, London. The analogy of ventriloquism is introduced to explore the ways that the object has been presented and interpreted in the Museum. It is used to illuminate how objects can carry the various meanings, interests, and prejudices (conscious and unconscious) of the human actors involved in their creation, collection and display. The article describes how the voices ‘ventriloquised’ through Hartree’s rebuilt ‘Trainbox’ have imbued this later version of the machine with the physical and instrumental functions of the original Analyser to make the object ‘fit’ with varying stories of computation, differential analysis, and models. The paper argues that the voices ventriloquised through the Trainbox have turned the object into the ‘material polyglot’ that sits in the Information Age gallery of the Science Museum today. The article concludes with the question of whether we can truly understand how objects change at the ‘hands-on’ level in museums, without including the simultaneous stories that an object shares with its audiences.

Watt’s workshop: craft and philosophy in the Science Museum

Accounts of the life of Scottish engineer James Watt have tended to take a rather monocular approach to his life’s work – primarily concentrating on the steam engine. However, the evidence of Watt’s workshop, preserved at the Science Museum, points to the diverse nature of his interests, and particularly to the close integration of philosophical and pragmatic elements in his work. Here is the workplace of one of the savant-fabricants that Britain’s ‘Industrial Enlightenment’ depended upon. All was, however, underpinned by physical work and the creation of tangible artefacts that took into account a range of factors at once technological, entrepreneurial, aesthetic and consumer-driven, a point worth emphasising in consideration both of Britain’s industrial revolution and the recent debate about a re-balancing of the UK economy towards manufacturing.

Technologies of Romance: looking for ‘object love’ in three works of video art

In this paper the author discusses three works of video art featured in the Technologies of Romance symposium held at the Science Museum, London, in 2018. The author searches within video art, as a genre or medium, within its technical apparatuses and within the three particular works, for contributions to the particular notion of ‘object love’ as drawn from a paper by Hilary Geoghegan and Alison Hess (2014). The author interprets the three video artists’ works with the aim of gleaning comparative examples that might illustrate or extend the ‘object love’ concept. Mathilde Roman’s book (2016) on the ‘staging’ of video art is an influence on the text, as are two short but profound statements by Walter Benjamin, one from his Theses on a Philosophy of History (1940), another from his essay on Surrealism (1929). History, ‘the past’, museology and ‘object love’ are all woven into the core of the article. As it moves towards its conclusion the author is inspired by the image of an empty, machine-made stocking (a classic symbol of Freudian fetishism) in Elizabeth Price’s video K, in such a way that the article ends by skewing both the idea of ‘object’, and that of ‘love’ in the direction of the fetish, while concluding that the past – just as much as any particular object from or of the past – tends to be subject to fetishisation. Meanwhile, video’s relative immateriality as an art medium, and its current use by artists, is seen as representative of an age of image-based archival practices that, assisted by digital technology, might now divert traditional, object-based processes of the museum – a shift that might be summed up in the phrase ‘screen becomes vitrine’. This shift, from vitrined objects to screened images might then, in turn, have implications for the ‘object love’ that initially interested Geoghegan and Hess and which began the author’s article and this dialogue with the Science Museum. This paper was published in Science Museum Journal's special 'Technologies of Romanc edition, which was based on, and featured several papers from a day-long symposium at the museum to celebrate the launch of my 2018 book 'Technologies of Romance - Part II. Both the symposium event and the spcieal edition of the journal featured my own paper and contributions from leading academics, curators and artists drawn from CSM, ScienceMuseum and beyond.

Artist interviews – new art for Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries

Opened in November 2019, Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries showcases four major new art commissions at the Science Museum, London. This article brings artistic and curatorial voices to reflect on their meaning, as Curator of Art Collections, Katy Barrett, talks with artists Eleanor Crook, Marc Quinn, and Sophie Nielsen and Rolf Knudsen of Studio Roso. They consider the process of producing the works, what they were inspired by and what is different about working in a medical or science context. This allows Barrett to reflect on all four commissions, how they fit into the history of art at the Science Museum, what they bring to the Museum’s collections, and what can be learnt from art in looking at and understanding science.

Visualising electricity demand: use and users of a 3D chart from the 1950s

Showing electricity demand by the hour, day, month and year, this 3D chart offers a rich visualisation of energy data in the UK from the years 1951–54. Acquired by the Museum of Science & Industry, Manchester, the object is significant as a tangible record of past practice, both of the electricity supply industry and its consumers. In this paper, we offer a close inspection of the object, and following its clues, we generate ideas about the chart’s use and users. In addition to commenting on the rhythmic patterning of daily and seasonal loads, we reflect on the role of the object at the time of its construction, in terms of forecasting, price-setting and load-shifting, and lobbying and demonstration. The object literally materialises electricity demand, providing a distinctive 3D representation, and in so doing prompting questions about how demand changes over time, and in time, and how our practices of everyday life constitute this demand. We conclude by offering a new interpretation of the object as a tool, as well as historical data.

Festschrift: of mice and myths: challenges and opportunities of capturing contemporary science in museums

Festschrift: of mice and myths: challenges and opportunities of capturing contemporary science in museums

Inventor, devoted daughter, or lover? Uncovering the life and work of Victorian naval engineer Henrietta Vansittart (1833–1883)

This article focuses on the life and work of Victorian naval engineer Henrietta Vansittart (1833–1883), who designed and patented the Lowe-Vansittart propeller, a model of which is held in the Science Museum collections. Vansittart is a rare example of a woman who practised as an engineer in nineteenth century Britain, yet hitherto she has not been the subject of extensive academic research. This article contributes to wider efforts to recover the multifaceted roles that women have historically played in engineering, which have often been obscured or overlooked.Using a range of primary sources, including a pamphlet written by Vansittart that is held in the Science Museum Library, alongside newspaper articles, contemporary engineering literature and personal letters, this article seeks to uncover what we can learn from her life and work. It will explore available routes into engineering for women in this period, when formal education and training opportunities were not open to them, and discuss how a woman in engineering could frame herself in this context. For Vansittart, her father’s engineering work was the vital access point to engineering. She did not receive a formal education, so it was through him that she informally learnt about the technicalities of screw propellers. This article will demonstrate the importance of family connections for women generally to enter into the field of engineering and reveal the ways in which Vansittart in particular used familial legacy to construct her position as an engineer, helping her to eschew prevalent gender norms. The article will also question why we do not know more about Vansittart’s career, by exploring the complexities of her personal life and how this may have impacted on her legacy.

Technologies of Romance: on the choice of a typeface for a book and the possibilities for technological Romance

This paper offers a rationale for the typefaces chosen for the publication Technologies of Romance: Part II written by Paul O’Kane and celebrated at a symposium held at the Science Museum in November 2018. In setting out this rationale the paper broadens its considerations to reflect on the extent to which typefaces might in themselves usefully be considered as technologies of Romance. It locates the practice of noting in print the typeface used in a given publication both historically and within contemporary practice. The recording of the decisions informing the making of a book starts to hint at the nature of the book itself as a technology, and allows for some discussion of the values of ‘making’ books within both past and present contexts of production, including the challenge of digital readers. Elaboration on the decisions concerning the use of a given typeface for a publication then opens out a discussion of the intention behind selection, and both the functional and emotional ambitions of the typeface choice. The associative aims informing selection of a typeface are explored against an understanding of the associative embedding of meaning within aspects of the terminology of typefaces, as well as the scripts they represent and their designed forms. The paper explores for example the imperial associations embedded in the character shapes of the basic letterforms, as well as the technological implications of the terms such as uppercase and lowercase and the problematic colonial implications of the term ‘Latin’ to describe the script in question. In considering the archival possibilities of typefaces as technologies the paper concludes by reflecting on examples of digital typeface design practice, which have actively sought to re-imagine a previous era of letterpress typesetting technology and the possibilities for investigating ongoing Romantic ideals within this very particular and highly specialised design discipline.

The Art and Science of Acoustic Recording: Re-enacting Arthur Nikisch and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra’s landmark 1913 recording of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony

The Art and Science of Acoustic Recording was a collaborative project between the Royal College of Music and the Science Museum that saw an historic orchestral recording from 1913 re-enacted by musicians, researchers and sound engineers at the Royal College of Music (RCM) in 2014. The original recording was an early attempt to capture the sound of a large orchestra without re-scoring or substituting instruments and represents a step towards phonographic realism. Using replicated recording technology, media and techniques of the period, the re-enactment recorded two movements of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony on to wax discs – the first orchestral acoustic recordings made since 1925. The aims were primarily to investigate the processes and practices of acoustic sound recording, developed largely through tacit knowledge, and to derive insights into the musicians’ experience of recording acoustically. Furthermore, the project sought to discover what the acoustic recordings of the past do – and don't – communicate to listeners today. Archival sources, historic apparatus and early photographic evidence served as groundwork for the re-enactment and guided its methodology, while the construction of replicas, wax manufacture and sound engineering were carried out by an expert in the field of acoustic recording. The wax recordings were digitised and some processed to produce disc copies playable on gramophone, thus replicating the entire course of recording, processing, duplication and reproduction. It is suggested that the project has contributed to a deeper understanding of early recordings and has provided a basis for further reconstructions of historical recording sessions.

Review: Science Museums in Transition: Cultures of Display in Nineteenth-Century Britain and America, edited by Carin Berkowitz and Bernard Lightman, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2017

Review: Science Museums in Transition: Cultures of Display in Nineteenth-Century Britain and America, edited by Carin Berkowitz and Bernard Lightman, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2017

생태전환교육 주제로 하는 지역 과학관의 전시 특성 분석

This study aims to analyze the ecological transformation education goals, theme-connectivity and exhibition types of articles permanently exhibited at Gimcheon Science Museum, which is a representative local science museum with the theme of ecological transformation education. When analyzing the connectivity with ecological transformation education goals and themes, this study found that the goal domain, ‘Knowledge and Energy Education on Human and Ecological System’, was highest in connectivity. This study discovered that the theme, ‘Energy Transformation’, was highest in connectivity. When analyzing the exhibition types, this study found that manipulative exhibition showed the highest frequency as a type of direct experience exhibition, while still image exhibition showed the highest frequency as a type of indirect experience exhibition. As long as the museum has exhibition halls focusing on exhibition related such themes as climate and energy, Gimcheon Science Museum should place more exhibits considering diversity of ecological transformation education themes, and since children are the main visitors, it is needed to organize participation-type, experiment- type and play-type exhibitions in connection with outdoor experience facilities.

Responding to stories: The 1876 Loan Collection of Scientific Apparatus and the Science Museum

Responding to stories: The 1876 Loan Collection of Scientific Apparatus and the Science Museum

Giovanni Canestrini’s models of Leonardo da Vinci’s friction experiments

Among the exhibits at the 2016 Leonardo da Vinci exhibition at the Science Museum, London, was one that purported to illustrate Leonardo’s experiments on friction. The models involved were the work of Giovanni Canestrini (1893–1975) who contributed to the 1939 and 1953 Leonardo exhibitions in Milan. This article discusses the original sources and history of these models, in the light of recent research into Leonardo’s work on friction. It concludes that, while being relevant to Leonardo’s study of mechanics, these models seriously misrepresent his experimental investigations of friction.

The Hugh Davies Collection: live electronic music and self-built electro-acoustic musical instruments, 1967–1975

The Hugh Davies Collection (HDC) at the Science Museum in London comprises 42 items of electronic sound apparatus owned by English experimental musician Hugh Davies (1943–2005), including self-built electro-acoustic musical instruments and modified sound production and manipulation hardware. An early proponent of ‘live electronic music’ (performed live on stage rather than constructed on magnetic tape in a studio), Davies’s DIY approach shaped the development of experimental and improvised musics from the late 1960s onwards. However, his practice has not been widely reported in the literature, hence little information is readily available about the material artefacts that constituted and enabled it. This article provides the first account of the development of Davies’s practice in relation to the objects in the HDC: from the modified electronic sound apparatus used in his early live electronic compositions (among the first of their kind by a British composer); through the ‘instrumental turn’ represented by his first self-built instrument, Shozyg I (1968); to his mature practice, where self-built instruments like Springboard Mk. XI (1974) replaced electronic transformation as the primary means by which Davies explored new and novel sound-worlds. As well as advancing knowledge of Davies’s pioneering work in live electronics and instrument-building and enhancing understanding of the objects in the HDC, this article shows how object biographic and archival methodologies can be combined to provide insight into the ways in which objects (instruments, technologies) and practices shape each other over time.

Embedding plurality: exploring participatory practice in the development of a new permanent gallery

Increasing numbers of museums and galleries worldwide have developed an array of working practices that might be termed 'participatory' or 'co-creative', which seek to involve visitors, non-visitors, community and interest groups with diverse forms of expertise and perspective in their activities. Frequently the central aim of such practices has been to strengthen relationships between a museum and its audiences through projects that are jointly conceived and developed with local communities. However, relatively little attention has been given to participatory practice within the work of larger institutions, particularly those with a national and international remit, reach and audience base, where participatory practices are adopted to enrich the development and content of new permanent displays (aimed at large and diverse audiences). Drawing on a single case study – the development of the permanent Information Age gallery at the Science Museum in London, which opened in 2014 – this paper aims to reflect upon the extent to which existing concepts, theories and approaches to participation and co-creation resonate with museum work of this kind. Unlike many participatory practices internationally, the range of projects and activities utilised in the development of Information Age were driven less by a desire to share authority and decision-making with communities outside the museum and more by a concern to foster involvement with diverse communities of interest in the making of a major gallery and to generate and embed plural perspectives on the objects and stories presented within it. This paper raises further questions around how participatory work is perceived, valued and shared across the sector.

The provenance and context of the Giustiniani Medicine Chest

In autumn 2019 the Science Museum will open its new Medicine Gallery, which is an opportunity to redisplay and reinterpret items from the collection. One object selected as a centrepiece for the new space is the Giustiniani Medicine Chest, which dates from the mid-sixteenth century. This object came into the Science Museum Collection in 1946 having originally been bought in Italy in 1924 by an agent of Sir Henry Wellcome for his medical collection. This article assesses its provenance and history.

Functionless: science museums and the display of ?pure objects?

Functionless: science museums and the display of ?pure objects?

Acoustics on display: collecting and curating sound at the Science Museum

Acoustics on display: collecting and curating sound at the Science Museum

Curating Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries

The curators of Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries reflect on their experiences of creating these significant new displays at the Science Museum in London. After summarising the historical medical displays at this museum, they outline the curatorial concepts behind their respective new galleries to explore the display strategies and processes behind the development of the new exhibits and highlight the significance of some of the objects that visitors can encounter today.