Object Matters

In this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by historian and author Dr Kiera Lindsey. Together they discuss her new book on colonial Sydney artist Adelaide Ironside titled Wild Love. Together they examine speculative history, writing biographies and art in colonial New South Wales, and explore Adelaide's complex relationship with University of Sydney founders William Charles Wentworth and Sir Charles Nicholson.Guest: Dr Kiera Lindsey is a creative historian who works across the public and academic sectors. She works at the History Trust of SA (HTSA) as South Australia’s History Advocate. She has over twenty years of research and writing experience in the area of nineteenth-century, Indigenous and women's histories and have also published nationally and internationally on the topics of speculative biography and life writing. She had served as Vice President of the History Council of New South Wales as well as a member of the Sydney Living Museum's Curatorial and Public Engagement Advisory Committee. She features regularly on radio and podcasts, and was a consultant and on-camera historian for a 4-part series entitled LAWLESS: The Real Bushrangers which first aired on Foxtel's History Channel in 2017. Kiera has also designed two online public history courses on the GLAM sector. Wild Love was published through Allen & Unwin in November 2023, joining her first book The Convict's Daughter, and a volume coedited with Donna Brien on the topic of speculative biography. Wild Love was the produce of an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Research Award (DECRA) while she was at University of Technology Sydney (UTS). Follow Kiera on X: @LindseyKieraHost: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on X and Instagram.Object details:Pietro Tenerani, life-size statue of William Charles Wentworth, marble, 1861. Purchased with funds from public subscription 1861 [UA1861.1]

In this special episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by Egyptian archaeologist Dr Heba Abd el-Gawad. Together they discuss the unique role ancient Egypt plays in museums globally, the missing modern Egyptian voice in ancient Egyptian exhibitions, decolonising collections and her work as part of the AHRC-funded project ‘Egypt’s Dispersed Heritage: views from Egypt’, partnering with UK museums and archives to communicate the history of cultural dispersal and examining opportunities to create dialogue with modern Egyptian communities.Guest: Dr Heba Abd el-Gawad is an Egyptian archaeologist. She is the project researcher for the AHRC funded project: ‘Egypt’s Dispersed Heritage: Views from Egypt’ at the Institute of Archaeology, University College of London aimed at amplifying the voice, visibility, and validity of modern Egyptian communities in UK museums. She has previously led various curatorial roles in the UK. Heba specializes in the history of Egyptian archaeology focusing on the past and present Egyptian perceptions and representations of the collection and distribution of archaeological finds from Egypt to the world. Follow @GawadHeba on X.Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on X and Instagram.

For this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by zoologist and 2023 Macleay Miklouho-Maclay Fellow Dr Angel Luis Viloria Petit, who has recently completed his research in Sydney, examining historic collections of butterflies. The Chau Chak Wing Museum houses the natural history collection of Alexander Macleay (1767-1848) largely amassed prior to his arrival in the colony of NSW in 1826. Many of the insects were acquired by Macleay from other naturalists, including Dru Drury (1725-1804) who published three volumes on butterflies. In his three months in Sydney, Venezuelan-based Dr Viloria has examined thousands of specimens in the collection and has successfully identified more than 260 primary type specimens, many from Drury's collections dating back to the 1770-1790s, identifiable from hand-painted illustrations from within those publications. Together they discuss Angel's career and research, the history of insect collecting, and early European collectors and the process of identifying primary type specimens in two hundred year old collections of butterflies using historical hand-painted illustrations. Read more on Dr Viloria's research while in Sydney.Guest: Dr Angel Viloria is a zoologist and entomologist at the Ecological Centre in Caracas, Venezuela and Senior Researcher at the Centre of Ecology of the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Investigations (IVIC), specialising in South American lepidoptera. He received a first degree in Biology from the Universidad del Zulia, Maracaibo, Venezuela, and his Doctorate of Philosophy (zoology) from a joint program of the University of London (King’s College) and the Natural History Museum, UK. He has pursued investigations on a variety of subjects related to zoology, theoretical biogeography, history and philosophy of the biological sciences. However, his main interest is on the systematics of butterflies of Tropical America, especially the Andean browns, members of the subfamily Satyrinae. In 2019-2020 he held the Simón Bolívar Visiting Chair at the University of Cambridge. He is is author and co-author of 110+ scientific papers, 210+ popular science articles and 8 books, including the standard reference, Catalogue of the hostplants of the Neotropical butterflies. 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:The Dru Drury collection of butterflies and moths within the Macleay natural history collections.

As the Chau Chak Wing Museum gets set to host the UMAC2023 conference, for this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by UMAC President and Chau Chak Wing Museum Research Fellow Dr Andrew Simpson.UMAC University Museums and Collections, an International Committee of ICOM (International Council of Museums) was founded in 2001 to advocate for university museums and teaching and research collections for museums around the globe. In this discussion, Craig and Andrew talk about the role of museums on a campus from a global perspective, UMAC as an organisation and the aims and ambitions of the 2023 iteration of the annual conference. They also speak at length about Andrew's new book, The Museums and Collections of Higher Education (Routledge 2023).Guest: Dr Andrew Simpson is President of UMAC University Museums and Collections and has extensive experience in higher education, heritage, museums and galleries . Andrew has a science back and he began his museum career as a curator at the University of Queensland. At Macquarie University he introduced and developed Australia's first undergraduate degree program in Museum Studies followed by named postgraduate degree programs. These programs were delivered by the Science Faculty and designed as an alternative to the usual art history / cultural heritage study to career path. It produced graduates for the sector with an enhanced understanding of science in museum practice. His research interests are the history, role and functions of museums in society, in particular, university museums, museum education, natural history and the public understanding of science, as well as his own scientific interests. 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 Chau Chak Wing Museum colleague Julian Woods, the museum's Public Engagement Co-ordinator.Julian discusses a photograph in the collection, acquired from the University of Sydney Union art collection in 2019, which Julian had previously featured in an exhibition he co-curated. The photography by Michael Riley (1960-2004) is a portrait of artist Tracey Moffatt taken in the mid-1980s. They discuss the work of both Riley and Moffatt, photography in Australia and the significance of the photograph within the context of the Boomalli Aboriginal Artist Co-operative.Guest: Julian Woods is Public Engagement Co-ordinator for the Chau Chak Wing Museum. In this role he assists with the development of public programs, education, and other outreach activities. Before joining the Museum, he worked at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery in audience engagement and curatorial. He has over 10 years experience working and volunteering in the arts and cultural sector and completed a BA at the University of Sydney with Honours in Art History and a Major in History, focusing on Australian art and Australian history. Follow him on @julianwoods92Host: 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:Tracey (Moffatt) hands up, Michael Riley, 1986, positive print – gelatin silver.Donated by University of Sydney Union 2019, University Art Collection [UA2019.144]

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 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)

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.

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_misrFollow Pauline on Twitter at @pauline03373392Host: 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 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 @aliceestevensonHost: Dr Craig Barker, Head of Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museum and Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.

For this episode of Object Matters host Dr Craig Barker is joined by Curator of Natural History Collections at the Chau Chak Wing Museum Dr Anthony Gill. In the lead up to National Science Week and the new exhibition Australian Seashores opening at the Chau Chak Wing Museum in August 2022, they discuss a photograph in the collection taken in the late 1940s in preparation for the book Australian Seashores.Professor William John Dakin (1883-1950), professor of zoology at the University of Sydney from 1929 until 1950, along with Elizabeth Pope and Isobel Bennett compiled the book Australian Seashores which was first published posthumously in 1952. Among the many photographs donated to the Macleay Museum collection in the 1980s by Dakin's family was an image of snapping shrimps taken in the 1940s.Tony and Craig discuss the snapping shrimp and the discovery of how the shrimp is able to create a noise by closing its claw so rapidly it creates shock waves, the importance of natural history collections, curating natural history exhibitions, Dakin's work and legacy and the role of citizen scientists. Guest: Dr Anthony Gill is a fish taxonomist, with decades of museum experience in Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom. He is Curator, Natural History Collections at 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. Object details: Photograph of two snapping shrimps with a third claw next used in the book Australian Seashores in 1952 [HP84.7.38.1]

This episode of Object Matters marks National Archaeology week. Host Dr Craig Barker is joined by Madeline Robinson, Support Officer for the Department of Archaeology at the University of Sydney. In recent years Madeline has overseen a project of recording a number of Chau Chak Wing Museum objects in 3D to be used in digital teaching of undergraduate courses. Photogrammetry is a technique that creates accurate and fully textured 3D models from photographs. It can be used to record both landscapes and objects of all sizes; allowing 3D prints and orthoimages (scaled images without distortion or perspective). Madeline discusses the role of photogrammetry in archaeology and museum contexts, and the role of digital archaeology more generally. Together in depth they discuss how she has recorded one of the museum’s numismatic items, a silver coin from Classical Athens and the complexities of recording a small object n 3D through marrying together hundreds of individual photographs and then how that digital recording may be used to allow greater access to the collection. In the discussion they prove that a digital recording of object matters as much as the object itself when it comes to engagement, teaching and research.Together they discuss new ways of seeing old objects, in celebration of National Archaeology Week.Guest: Madeline Robinson is Support Officer for the Department of Archaeology at the University of Sydney. She has considerable archaeological field experience in Australia and abroad and manages the archaeology lab at the university. She also manages the @sydneyarchaeology social media account on Instagram and can be followed on her personal Twitter account @MGP_Robinson. Host: 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: Athenian silver tetradrachm, Athens, Greece, 449-404 BC. Obverse: Head of Athena facing right; reverse: owl standing facing right, olive sprig top left and moon to right. Acquired before 2004 [NM2004.655] The image is of its 3D recorded form accessible via Sketchfab.

In this episode of Object Matters Lauren Poole, a writer and disabled postgraduate student of museum studies at the University of Sydney joins host Dr Craig Barker. Together they speak about the more than 100 rubber fragments of the "Cotton aerodynamic anti-G (CAAG) flying suit" in the collection. Designed during World War Two at the University of Sydney by the Professor of Physiology between 1942 and 1955, named Frank Cotton, , the suit was produced in conjunction with the Royal Australian Air Force to minimise the effects of high-speed flying on pilots and to prevent blackouts. Representing a remarkable career Cotton (1890-1955) has also been inducted in the Australian Sports Hall of Fame for his contribution to sports science. Although the Cotton Suit was designed for aviation use, Lauren sees it conceptually as a precursor to sequential compression devices (SCDs) used in treatment of blood pooling and to improve blood circulation in the legs.Lauren asks us to challenge ableism within a museum context. Why do we not see the Cotton suit as a disability object? And what other disability objects may we see in museum and gallery collections? Can we rethink the conversation in museums about disability representation within material culture?Guest: Lauren Poole is a writer and postgraduate student of the University of Sydney’s Museum and Heritage Studies programs. Lauren is a trained archaeologist and a disability advocate, who has published recently in ‘Growing Up Disabled in Australia’ And ‘Earth Cries: A Climate Change Anthology’. Follow Lauren @laurenlpoole 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: Parts from prototypes of the Cotton Aerodynamic Anti-G (CAAG) suit [SC1995.60.1-117]Read more on the Cotton suit in this paper by Dr Peter Hobbins, on the challenges of preserving the suit in this blog and for an image of Cotton and the suit being worn by pilots during the war from the Faculty of Medicine’s collection visit here.