Object Matters

Marking National Archaeology Week 2023, in this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by Associate Professor Lesley Beaumont, a classical archaeologist in the School of Humanities, in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Sydney. Together they discuss one of the most iconic objects in the Chau Chak Wing Museum, the Nicholson Hermes. This Roman marble statue of the 1st century BC or 1st century AD is carved from white marble, the surface of which is deeply weathered through contact with running water. Lesley and Craig discuss archaeology in the 21st century, the Zagora Archaeological Project, Greek and Roman art, the famed sculptor Praxiteles and teaching students in the museum.

Guest: Associate Professor Lesley Beaumont is Associate Professor in the Discipline of Archaeology at the University of Sydney. Prior to taking up her position at the University, she was Assistant Director of the British School at Athens. Her publications include Childhood in Ancient Athens. Iconography and Social History (Routledge: 2012, 2015), and a Routledge Handbook on Children in Antiquity, co-edited with Matthew Dillon and Nicola Harrington. Her current archaeological fieldwork focuses on the Early Iron Age settlement site of Zagora on the Greek island of Andros. She serves as a Council Member of the Australian Archaeological Institute at Athens, and as an Expert Examiner for the Australian Government’s Office for the Arts under the Protection of Movable Cultural Heritage Act 1986.

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Object details:
The Nicholson Hermes, statue of an unknown man sculpted after Hermes by Praxiteles, white marble, Roman, 1st century BC - 1st century AD, Smyrna, Anatolia.
Donated by the sons of Sir Charles Nicholson 1935 [NM35.120].
View the statue in 3D.

In this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by Classics PhD candidate and 2023 Fellow of the Australian Archaeological Institute at Athens Alyce Cannon. They discuss two ancient vases from Athens relevant to Alyce's current doctoral research on dogs in ancient Greece.

Using two choes (ancient small, squat wine vessels) in the University of Sydney's collection they discuss how dogs were depicted in Classical Athens, what role dogs had in society and the correlation between a new sense of childhood and relationships with pets in the traumatic era of the end of Classical experiment in Athens following plague and the decades long Peloponnesian War and examine the reasons why dogs may have been depicted on these vessels that symbolise childhood.

Guest: Alyce Cannon is undertaking a PhD in the Discipline of Classics and Ancient History under the supervision of Professor Julia Kindt, as a part of the ARC Future Fellowship Project on “The Humanity of Man and the Animal in Ancient Greece”. Alyce’s thesis is entitled: “KYNIKA: Thinking With the Dog in Ancient Greece”. She is currently in Athens as the 2023 Australian Archaeological Institute at Athens Fellow.

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Objects details:
Attic red figure chous, c. 425-400BC, ceramic, Athens, Greece.
Donated by the Classical Association 1946 [NM46.49].
Illustrated.

Attic red figure chous, attributed to Crawling Boy Work-shop, Class of the Sydney Chous, c. 430-420BC, , Group of Karlsruhe 66/140, c. 350-300 BC, ceramic, Athens, Greece.
Donated by Sir Charles Nicholson 1860 [NM98.37]

In this special episode of Object Matters, hear a live recording of a public event held in March 2023, when visual artist Mikala Dwyer is interviewed by Toni Ross about the Chau Chak Wing Museum's fourth contemporary art project titled Mikala Dwyer: Penelope and the Seahorse. 

The exhibition at the Chau Chak Wing Museum is an aquatic-themed installation bristling with allusions to hippocampus, the genus name of the seahorse, derived from the Ancient Greek meaning ‘horse’ and ‘sea monster’.

In a wide ranging discussion they cover Mikala's practices, memory associations, the endangered status of seahorses, how she engaged with museum collection items including seahorse specimens (for example MHF.266) and ancient Greek vases depicting maritime mythology (for example NM98.41 and NMR.1021.1 both of which are in the exhibition), and how the name hippocampi was used for a structure within the brain that is shaped like a seahorse. Humans and other mammals have two hippocampi, one in each of the temporal lobes. We are always with seahorses.

Guest:
Mikala Dwyer was born in Sydney in 1959 and now lectures at RMIT in Melbourne.
Mikala Dwyer has exhibited widely in Australia and internationally since the 1980s and is known for her distinctive experiments in sculpture, installation, and performance art.  Her practice is predominantly installation-based, in which she constructs idiosyncratic, personal spaces within the conventional architecture of the gallery, using materials that have a strong association with the body.

Mikala is interviewed by curator Dr Toni Ross, Honorary Senior Lecturer (Art Theory), Faculty of Arts, Design and Architecture, UNSW.

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Exhibition details: Mikala Dwyer: Penelope and the Seahorse (until October 2023)

For this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by university administrator, historian and former museum administrator Dr Toner Stevenson. Toner is the co-author with Dr Nick Lomb, of the new book Eclipse Chasers (2023).

Using a coin of the Roman emperor Nerva, minted in 96 AD when he came to power, they discuss how his funeral two years later coincided with a solar eclipse and how humans have interacted with eclipses for millennia. From Australian First Nation astronomy to the successful 1922 Australian scientific expeditions to capture data to prove Einstein's theory that gravity could bend the fabric of time and space - a project commemorated in its centenary year last year in postage stamps and in minted coins - bringing us back to Nerva's coin.

Guest:
Dr Toner Stevenson is Head of the School of Humanities in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Sydney. She is also a Honorary Associate in the Discipline of History at the school. She gained her doctorate in Social Sciences in 2016, after a long career in museums with leadership roles at the the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, including the Sydney Observatory where she was able to combine her museology interests with her passion for astronomy. She witness a total solar eclipse in 2012.  

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Objects details: Silver Denarius of Nerva, 96 AD, minted in Rome, Italy. Acquired before 2004 [NM2004.1667]

On this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by art historian and current University of Sydney Museum and Heritage Studies Program postgraduate student Dr Ksenia Radchenko. Ksenia is also a museum educator. Ksenia gained her PhD in Russian art history from the University of Southern California.
However on Object Matters we are not discussing 20th century Soviet art. Instead we discuss her internship with the Chau Chak Wing Museum on more than 800 electrotype coins purchased from the British Museum in 1945 but remain uncatalogued.
 
Ksenia takes us through what electrotypes are, why they were made for research and teaching and an overview of the collection of electrotype coins in Sydney and their history. She discusses the importance of internships in museum research and then Ksenia takes us on a deep dive of a copy of a coin from Lydia in modern Turkey which features the earliest known portrait of a ruler in the history of coinage. Can we use copies to learn about the past? Ksenia thinks we can.

Guest: Dr Ksenia Radchenko is an art historian and museum educator. In 2023 she completed an internship with the Chau Chak Wing Museum.

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Objects details:
Electrotype of a coin, c. 480-400 BC, Lydia Turkey. IRN 344404.

For this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by Classicist and Greek cultural historian Professor Alastair Blanshard, from the University of Queensland. They discuss two of Alastair's favourite vases in the Chau Chak Wing Museum collection: two fish plates from ancient Magna Grecia (South Italy), NM46.55 and NM80.48. Together they cover the symbolism of the depiction of seafood in a social context in the ancient Greek world, the function of these vases, and the role of food in ancient societies as well as the joys of taking up fishing as a hobby later in life.

Guest: Professor Alastair Blanshard is Paul Eliadis Chair of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Queensland. As a Greek cultural historian, Alastair's research interests include the social and cultural history of ancient Athens, Greek gender and sexuality, epigraphy, the classical tradition and the reception of the past in the modern world. He has authored books including Classical World: All That Matters (2016), Classics on Screen: Ancient Greece and Rome on Film (2012) and Hercules: Scenes from an Heroic Life (2005).
Follow Alastair on Twitter at @AlastairBlan

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Objects details:
Campanian fish plate, The Torpedo Painter, c. 325-300 BC, ceramic, Campania, Italy. Purchased with funds from the Friends of the Nicholson Museum 1946  [NM46.55].
Illustrated.

Apulian fish plate, Group of Karlsruhe 66/140, c. 350-300 BC, ceramic, Apulia, Italy. Donated 1980 [NM80.48]

In this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by Egyptologists and archaeologists Dr Melanie Pitkin and Pauline Stanton to discuss stelae and what they can tell us about ancient Egyptian society.

Focusing on a stele (NMR.53) donated by collection founder Sir Charles Nicholson, they discuss the function, manufacture and meaning of stelae for ancient Egyptians. This stele features an image of the deceased Ahmose is sitting on a chair with offerings presented to him by his "brother" Ahmose. Behind the latter stands a woman called Ipdjuju who could either be the his wife or the daughter of the deceased. It is an insight into how Egyptians wanted to be remembered.

Together they also discuss the current interdisciplinary Egyptian Stelae Project run out of the Chau Chak Wing Museum which has been generously supported by the Centre for Ancient Cultures, Heritage and the Environment (CACHE) at Macquarie University, and explain how important these objects are. 


Guests:
Dr Melanie Pitkin is the Senior Curator of the Nicholson Collection at the Chau Chak Wing Museum. She holds a PhD in Egyptology from Macquarie University and a Masters in Museum Studies from the University of Sydney. Prior to joining the Chau Chak Wing Museum, she worked at the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Powerhouse Museum.
Pauline Stanton is a doctoral researcher at Macquarie University. She teaches ancient Egyptian languages at Macquarie and Monash Universities.  

Follow Melanie on Twitter at @melanie_misr
Follow Pauline on Twitter at @pauline03373392


Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Object details: limestone stele, Thebes, Egypt, 18th Dynasty (1550 BC - 1295 BC). Donated by Sir Charles Nicholson, 1860 [NMR.53]

In this episode of Object Matters, the Brickman, Ryan McNaught joins host Dr Craig Barker to discuss his recent build currently displayed in the Chau Chak Wing Museum, Lego Tutankhamun.
Together they discuss his career as a professional Lego builder, why he has worked with museums, how Lego is enjoyable for fans of all ages, and whether fun models like this have a role within a museum context. They also discuss past builds including Lego Colosseum, The Lego Acropolis and Lego Pompeii which is currently displayed at the Chau Chak Wing Museum as part of the Roman Spectres exhibition. All models have much media attention over the years and have served well as educational resources, but now is a chance to speak to their creator about how he has worked with museums over the years.


Guest: Ryan McNaught, aka The Brickman, is the only professionally certified Lego Builder in Australia. 
Since 2019 Ryan has been the judge on Channel 9's TV series, Lego Masters Australia. Follow Ryan on Instagram and @_TheBrickman on Twitter or visit The Brickman website.

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Object details: Lego Tutankhamun. A model of the lid of middle coffin found in  Tutankhamun's tomb (KV62) by Howard Carter in 1923. Created by The Brickman in 2022 from 14,534 Lego bricks.

In this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by museum archaeologist Associate Professor Alice Stevenson to discuss museum archaeology and a number of projects Alice is directing which is examining Egypt's dispersed heritage and how museums narrate collections of Egyptology.

In a wide ranging conversation they talk about decolonising Egyptian collections, contemporary art in museum installations and finding ways to engage community voices in museum exhibitions.

Guest: Associate Professor Alice Stevenson teaches and researches museum studies at the Institute of Archaeology at UCL in London. Her research interests include museum archaeology, the history of collections, human remains in museums and museum and source communities. She recently edited The Oxford Handbook of Museum Archaeology (2022), which brings together some 50 international scholars and professionals to present an original transnational reference point for critical engagements with the legacies of, and futures for, global archaeological collections.
Follow Dr Stevenson on Twitter @aliceestevenson

Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

In this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by cultural historian Dr Cindy McCreery. 2022 is a particularly important year for the British royal family with the Platinum Jubilee. It is also a period of transition for the institution.

Together for this episode Cindy and Craig discuss a commercially produced children's lantern slide of the first decade of the twentieth century featuring King Edward VII, Queen Alexandria and the Prince of Wales, later to be George V, and his wife Mary. Produced by W. Butcher and Sons, c. 1901-1907, the slide provides a remarkable insight into another time of transition for the monarchy, following the death of Victoria and the royal family's use of modern technologies to present themselves to the public in a reassuring manner.

The conversation covers colonialism and royalty, mass consumption in the early twentieth century, Australia's complex relationship with the monarchy and the way historians can use materiality to better understand the past.


Guest: Dr Cindy McCreery is a Senior Lecturer in the Discipline of History in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Sydney. She is a cultural historian with an interest in visual and material culture of both the maritime British Empire and British royalty. She is author and editor of several books including The Satirical Gaze: Prints of Women in Late Eighteenth-Century England (2004) and 2020's Monarchies and Decolonisation in Asia and convened this year's 'Going Platinum: Australian responses to the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, 1952-2022' conference. Follow @DrCindyMcCreery on Twitter.


Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

Object details: Magic lantern slide strip, coloured; rectangular glass slide with 4 images; royal family; portraits of King, Queen, Prince and Princess of Wales; from "Primus' Magic Lantern Slides set series VI Nursery Tales, produced by Butcher & Sons, c. 1901-1907 [SC1987.12.6.6]
Read more about children lantern slides in the Chau Chak Wing Museum collection.