An exciting new dinosaur is discovered. Seven billion years old … A crate from a famous dino dig in Lesotho. Natural History Museum: World of Wonder s1e4
The Natural History Museum … is also home to over 300 experts who study the natural world in labs across its sites. But much of that work takes place out in the field. ibid.
The Natural History Museum is full of unique objects that stretch thousands of years back in time, from prehistoric men to ancient insects and dinosaur fossils. ibid.
The Natural History Museum has 28 galleries and 450 interactive exhibits. ibid.
In this iconic building beyond its giant doors is one of the finest natural history collections in the world; from rare space rocks to the dodo, it’s collection spans four billion years. Natural History Museum: World of Wonder s2e1, Channel 5 2023
Tonight they are hosting a super-sized sleepover for several hundred guests. ibid.
It never stops for the museum’s 900 staff … The wildlife photographer of the year awards … The largest photography competition of its type in the world. Natural History Museum: World of Wonder s2e2
The ancient Egyptians: they built great pyramids, temples and tombs in life in a bid to become immortal after death. Along with magnificent monuments this civilisation is best known for giving the world the Egyptian mummy. Wonders of preservation, these mummies have left us a truly astonishing legacy. Egypt’s Great Mummies Unwrapped with Bettany Hughes, Channel 5 2021
10) Someone who died over 3,200 years ago and who lived as the most powerful man on Earth: Ramesses II, or Ramesses the Great, still holds court in Cairo. ibid.
This is the Great Temple of Karnak, and you’ve made your way in through these massive pylons, which are kind of monumental gateways. ibid.
9) One of the most beautiful Egyptians in existence: Seti I … He was a hugely successful pharaoh … some of the finest mummification work in all of history … Typically, you’re brain is pulled out through your nostrils with an iron hook. Next, all of your major organs are removed apart from the heart: ancient Egyptians believed this was the centre of the being … ibid.
The priests masterminded a high-risk mission: to rescue the mummies of great pharaohs, so what you have here is a roll-call of Egyptian power … bringing them here in secret and lowering them down into that shaft, where they stayed undisturbed for 3,000 years. ibid.
8) A long-forgotten pharaoh hidden deep in the desert … deep into the Nile delta … the lost city of Tanis … a new capital city and harbour in the north … Its tombs and mummies were abandoned to the sands … Right in the centre of this room was a solid silver coffin … A gold mask and breathtaking jewellery fit for a king … A forgotten pharaoh: Shoshenq II. ibid.
7) The Magnificent Great Pyramid of Giza: it’s over 4,500 years old and built as a giant tomb for a pharaoh. But my next mummy pre-dates the Great Pyramid by 1,000 years … I’m heading to the British museum in London, home to one of the largest collections of ancient Egyptian mummies in the world. Let me introduce you to Gebelein Man … takes us right back to the start of Egyptian mummification … The searingly hot conditions in the desert dried out and mummified Gebelein Man’s body, making him a natural mummy. ibid.
6) The ancient Egyptians didn’t just mummify humans but animals too … The Hawk Mummy … ‘We found that it’s a mammal, possibly a primate … a human baby … most probably male.’ ibid.
5) Karnak, a vast temple complex … Someone has gone to a huge amount of effort to hack out the face and the body that was once on these walls … A woman in a man’s world … Hatshepsut … identified in 2007 … a rare female pharaoh. ibid.
4) The British Museum in London is now home to now fewer than 140 Egyptian mummies. In a corner of the museum’s storeroom hides my next mummy … Padiamenet. ibid.
3) Ramesses III has had his throat slit … There really could have been a harem conspiracy. ibid.
2) One of Egypt’s most controversial leaders … He was a pioneer and an out and out rebel … Akhenaten. When a tomb was discovered in 1907 the plot only thickened. What was discovered here just didn’t add up: grave goods scattered across the floor and a dumped beaten-up coffin apparently containing the decomposed body of Akhenaten himself. He wasn’t being treated like a royal mummy. ibid.
Tutankhamun immediately reversed his father’s ideas and returned the royal court to Luxor. Akhenaten’s coffin and his mummy were left abandoned … After his death, Akhenaten was unmourned and unloved. ibid.
1) The most famous pharaoh in the world. His solid gold death-mask and over 5,000 of the treasures buried with him have given us an incredible insight into the lives of the ancient Egyptians. ibid.
That winter, Banksy entered Tate Britain, placed a painting on the wall and walked into the history books. With incursions into museums and galleries, and other stunts that followed, Banksy pioneered a new type of performance art. Banksy & the Rise of Outlaw Art, Sky Arts 2021
Size matters: this is Tate Modern, the triumphant monster among contemporary art galleries. And with nearly six million visitors a year, it’s in the top ten most visited galleries and museums all around the world. Great Paintings of the World with Andrew Marr: Picasso’s Weeping Woman, Channel 5 2021
Nestled in New York’s Central Park this is the largest art museum in America. The Metropolitan Museum of Art is 2.3 million square feet of objects spanning 5,000 years of history. The Met is a collection of collections: paintings, jewellery, textiles, statuary, and the world’s most famous fashion gala. It’s America’s treasure house. In 2020 the Met turned 150. Inside America’s Treasure House: The Met, BBC 2021
Their collection of some 30,000 garments spans five centuries … Textiles are extensively researched. ibid.
The Met is a world leading collection of Dutch masters. ibid.
1There are around 2,000 staff, most of them unseen maintaining and expanding the collections. ibid.
100 works by 88-year-old painter Gerhard Richter explore a subject that suddenly seems tiny: racial intolerance and inhumanity. Inside America’s Treasure House: The Met II
The Met was born in an era when some collectors’ tools were a pickaxe and a sense of entitlement. ibid.
The Met is cashstrapped but must lend and borrow on a global scale to mount exhibitions visitors will pay good money to see. Inside America’s Treasure House: The Met III
The cash crisis has led to a freeze on acquisitions. ibid.
Boston, Massachusetts, 18 March 1990: A baffling heist in which priceless paintings vanish into thin air … The largest property theft in American history, a museum heist in which priceless pieces of art were taken and to this day are still missing. The Unexplained with William Shatner s2e8: Outrageous Robberies, History 2022
Oil billionaire and art collector J Paul Getty … The Getty Centre museum – it has a priceless collection of art, and it’s one of the wealthiest institutions of its kind in the world. Gettys: The World’s Richest Art Dynasty, BBC 2018
Three generations of Gettys have used art and wealth to change the art world and British culture for ever. ibid.
Mark is a passionate collection of contemporary art. ibid.
The offer from oil giant Texaco would ultimately be successful. The sale of Getty Oil for $10 billion would be the biggest corporate takeover in history. ibid.
Across two decades Paul Getty donated over £15m to the BFI. The film and television heritage of Britain received a new lease of life. ibid.
Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art protest Nan Goldin et al: ‘Sacklers’ lies, people die.’ Arena: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed, BBC 2023
Nan Goldin: The Ballad of Sexual Dependency 1983-2022 (35mm slideshow) ibid.
My relationship to Oxycontin started several years ago in Berlin. It was originally prescribed for surgery. So I took it as directed. I got addicted overnight. In the beginning 40 mg was too strong. But as my habit grew there was never enough. I went from 3 pills a day as prescribed to 18. ibid.
Crushing and snorting was my full-time job. When I got out of treatment I learned that the Sackler family whose name I knew from museums and galleries were responsible for the epidemic …. I started a group P.A.I.N. to hold them accountable. ibid.
‘There’s the family of the art world, and the museum world and philanthropy. And then there’s the grubby, unpleasant story of Big Pharma marketing and death.’ ibid.
My anger at the Sackler family. It’s personal. I hate these people. But it’s not about my own addiction. ibid.
All the museums, institutions, need to stop taking money from these corrupt evil bastards. ibid. Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art protest