Over the winter break, I visited the Drents Museum in Assen, Netherlands and I found the object I wanted to pick for our first ‘Object of the Week’ which was this work by artist Matthias Garff, called ‘Insektenkasten’ (Insect Case). The work was part of a wider exhibition called ‘Microcosm – the world in a Wunderkammer’, looking at the history behind Cabinets of Curiosity and exploring the Eurocentric collections, bringing modern art into dialogue with genuine specimens to cr

Losing a hand can be quite problematic, especially if you’re someone living in the 16 th  century. Medicine and prosthetics were not as advanced as they are today, and life was hazardous enough without worrying about infection from cuts or loss of limb. However, losing a hand was nothing for Gottfried von Berlichingen zu Hornberg (figure 1), or Götz for short. Götz was a German Imperial Knight, poet, and mercenary in the 1500s who fought in numerous military campaigns all whi

Radiation is present in our everyday lives, whether we realise it or not. There’s always background radiation, for example, that we all get doses of every day. Then there’s examples like going for a CT-Scan or X-Ray at the doctors. But what about more uncommon methods, from areas you might visit with friends or family, like a museum? How could a museum possibly give off radiation? Well, let me first give a little context about radiation and why it’s both fascinating and terri

Although museums may feel ubiquitous to us today, appearing across the world and in many shapes and sizes, the words we use to describe them are far from universal. Given the familiarity many of us have with museums, we can certainly be excused for not stopping to think about the name we give them, in English ‘museum’. Many languages have similar words, with a shared etymology (or origin) being the Ancient Greek term Μουσεῖον (museion), meaning ‘a seat/place of the Muses’. I

Museums as a societal construct are widely considered to be a Victorian and 18th century idea, stemming from the “collection craze” of the Victorians and the spread of colonialism during the early-modern period of history. The Capitoline Museums in Rome are considered the oldest public museum, when in 1471 Pope Sixtus IV donated some bronze sculptures to the people of Rome, and over several hundred years other popes donated more and more before Pope Clement XII opened it in 1

I love LEGO. There’s a good chance that you, dear reader, are also a fan of LEGO. Even if you aren’t, statistically there’s over 80 LEGO bricks per person in the world. So why am I bringing up LEGO? Well, museums as a medium are quite often depicted in children’s toys, but exactly how are they represented? Is there a trend in what play sets are in terms of size and content? Do different companies have a different view on what a museum playset should be? Whilst scrolling Linke