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“For the Curious and Interested” exhibition is open from January to July 2024

The ‘Sloane Lab: Looking back to build future shared collections,’ a Towards a National Collection Discovery Project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, led by UCL and TU Darmstadt, the British Museum and the Natural History Museum” is supporting a recently-opened exhibition in Northern Ireland. “For the Curious and Interested” exhibition is open from January to July 2024.

Prof Dr Julianne Nyhan, FRHistS, Technische Universität Darmstadt and University College London, said:

“The Sloane Lab project works to mend the broken links between the past and present of the founding collection of the British Museum, Natural History Museum and the British Library”


“This important exhibition shows how local communities, curators and academics can work together to ensure that heritage collections can be made available to the widest possible audiences, who can then use, learn and benefit from them, developing new perspectives on our shared history.”

Physician and naturalist Sir Hans Sloane (1660−1753) left his collection of antiquities, artworks and natural curiosities to the nation on his death, intending for it to be preserved and used for the purpose of ‘satisfying the desire of the curious.’

This touring exhibition will, for the first time, reunite a selection of objects from the collection that Sloane assembled, including books and prints, cultural objects, and natural history rarities, that are now cared for by the British Museum, the British Library and the Natural History Museum.

Confronting the complex history behind Sloane’s vast collection, which was financed in part by profits from transatlantic enslavement, the touring exhibition will reveal how and why objects from across the world were brought together. It will also explore some of the stories of those Sloane worked with and relied upon for their knowledge and skills, including indigenous and enslaved people, as well as other collectors, explorers and naturalists around the world.

Wenceslaus Hollar (1607–77), etching of a paper nautilus shell, c. 1646 | Woodblock print of a bird and hydrangeas, China, c.1690–1720
© 2024 The Trustees of the British Museum

Demonstrating the breadth and diversity of the collection that Sloane assembled, each item in this exhibition offers a unique insight into Sloane’s curiosity about the world. Key objects include:

  • Carved ivory hunting horn (about 1490–1530) Local artists in Sierra Leone carved this ornate horn with images of Portuguese men who went to the West Coast of Africa to trade in gold, ivory and people. The imperial iconography suggests this horn was commissioned for a Portuguese patron, but local artists also included African
    animals including crocodiles and serpents.

  • A Voyage to Jamaica (1725) Loaned by the Natural History Museum. Sloane’s personal copy of his book about the natural history of Jamaica, based on his time there in 1687–89, while he was physician to the Governor of the island. This lavishly illustrated book features images of animals and plants. Sloane also describes the violent treatment of enslaved African people he witnessed during this time.

  • Silk embroidered flowers (17th century) Loaned by the British Library. Stitches of golden thread form delicate curving branches that are the backdrop for these lush embroidered flowers. Highly stylised, they were created by an unrecorded Chinese artist with thread coloured by botanically-sourced dyes. These rare textiles may have been acquired by those working for the East India or Dutch East India Companies who knew of Sloane’s interest in botany.

  • Six etchings of shells, Wenceslaus Hollar (about 1645−46) Made by the Bohemian printmaker, Wenceslaus Hollar, these rare, detailed etchings depict shells of tropical species from south-east Asia. Such shells were imported to Europe in the 1600s, often for use in ornamental objects. Shells were a rich source of artistic investigation, but they also had ritual and practical uses in indigenous cultures.

Silk embroidered flowers, China, 17th century. © British Library | Carved ivory hunting horn made by unrecorded Sapi artists, Sierra Leone, c. 1490–1530. © 2024 The Trustees of the British Museum


OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
valentinaprishchepova (February 20, 2024). “For the Curious and Interested” exhibition is open from January to July 2024. HDSM. Retrieved May 16, 2025 from https://hdsm.hypotheses.org/2520


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