Captivating and Curious

Fauna and nationalism

MacKenzie’s interest in Australian fauna reflected a strong sense of nationalism. He believed in the uniqueness of the Australian environment and his desire to collect was, in part, an expression of pride in Australia.

This sense of patriotism was combined with a social Darwinist world view which saw humans at the apex of evolutionary development. As MacKenzie described it, ‘man is distinguished from all other animals by the fact that he stands and walks on the two hind or lower limbs leaving the fore or upper limbs free’.

For MacKenzie, this erect posture was the basis of human intelligence. In a strange twist he believed that Australians were unusually blessed in this regard: Australian football as an exercise, he argued, was more conducive to erect posture than almost any other game in the world! ‘It is founded on sound physiological lines and has been a no small factor in the physical development of our nation,' he wrote.

Pacific Islands

In addition to Aboriginal material, the National Ethnographic collection also included examples of Pacific material culture. This was material collected by officials during the period of Australia’s administration of Papua in the early 20th century.

These collections are known as the Official Papuan collection. Originally intended for a Papuan museum, the collections were sent for safekeeping to the Australian Museum in Sydney. They were then sent to the Australian Institute of Anatomy in 1934.

Objects in the Official Papuan collection include material collected by FE Williams who served as government anthropologist in Papua from 1922 to 1943.

The Institute of Anatomy continued acquiring ethnographic material after the retirement of MacKenzie in 1937. This was partly because of the historical precedent MacKenzie established, but also for the pragmatic reason that there was no other Commonwealth institution in which to store this material. The Institute of Anatomy had become, almost by default, home to these collections.

A good example of a collection acquired in this way was the material collected under the auspices of the American-Australian Expedition to Arnhem Land in 1948. This was a multidisciplinary expedition which set out to explore the Aboriginal culture and natural history of Arnhem Land.

Objects collected were distributed between American and Australian institutions. The expedition helped change perceptions of Aboriginal paintings, encouraging people to view them as art rather than simply as ethnographic objects.

The Institute of Anatomy also stored collections on behalf of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies (AIAS). AIAS was created in 1961 with the aim of promoting research into Indigenous culture. It funded fieldwork around Australia and purchased significant collections of Indigenous material.

One of its major areas of material culture collecting was bark paintings, resulting in one of the largest collections of barks in the world. Collections acquired by AIAS were mainly sourced from Northern Australia.

In 1989 AIAS was reformed as the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) and is now collocated on Acton Peninsula with the National Museum of Australia.

National Museum of Australia

In 1974 concern about the preservation of historical material saw the Australian Government establish an inquiry into museums and national collections. This inquiry, which came to be known as the Pigott report after its chair Peter Pigott, delivered its findings in 1975.

The report concluded that the ‘deterioration of valuable collections in Australian museums, great and small, has reached the proportion of a crisis’. The report’s central recommendation was that a ‘Museum of Australia be established in Canberra’.

The proposal for the creation of a national museum was well received on both sides of politics. In 1980 the National Museum of Australia Act was passed with bipartisan support. The key function of the Museum would be to ‘develop and maintain a national collection of historical material’.

This collection would be known as the National Historical Collection. Minister for Home Affairs, Bob Ellicott, described the three main themes of the Museum as ‘the history of Aboriginal Man, the history of non-Aboriginal man and the interaction of man with his environment’.

The first collections to be absorbed by the National Historical Collection were the MacKenzie collection and the National Ethnographic collection. The Museum’s legislation specifically made provision for the transfer of these collections from the Institute of Anatomy.

The Act also allowed for collections held by other Commonwealth bodies to be transferred as required. Over the 1980s and 1990s the Museum accepted transfers of historical material from several government departments, including the Australian Broadcasting Commission, Australia Post, CSIRO, and the Bureau of Mineral Resources.

In this way the Museum was able to rapidly consolidate a number of existing Commonwealth collections to provide the core the National Historical Collection.

In addition to these government collections, the Museum began acquiring material in its own right. This included donations from the general public, purchases at auction and targeted collecting projects.

In the 1980s social history was the dominant theoretical model for exploring history in museums. Museums such as the Powerhouse, Hyde Park Barracks and Museum of Victoria were the major exponents of this approach in Australia. Collections were built around themes such as working life, domestic life and leisure. This was reflected at the National Museum of Australia in the acquisition of collections documenting iconic Australian consumer items such as the Victa lawnmower and Hills hoist.

Environmental history

One of the Museum’s key themes, human interaction with the environment, has been the focus of several targeted collecting projects. This has resulted in significant collections concerning the history of the Murray–Darling Basin, the impact of introduced species, salinity in the Murray–Darling basin, and the history of bushwalking.

One major acquisition on permanent display is the ‘buffalo catcher’. This vehicle is fitted with a special bionic arm and was used for catching buffalo in the Northern Territory in the 1980s. This is a powerful object for exploring one of the largest and most successful feral animal eradication programs in Australia’s history.

References

Committee of Inquiry on Museums and National Collections, Museums in Australia 1975: Report of the Committee of Inquiry on Museums and National Collections including the report of the Planning Committee on the Gallery of Aboriginal Australia, Canberra, AGPS, 1975.

House of Representatives Hansard, 2 April 1980.

David Kaus, ‘Collecting by Railway: The Milne Collection of Ethnology’, unpublished masters thesis, University of Canberra, Canberra, 1998, p.63.

Colin MacKenzie, ‘The Importance of Zoology to Medical Science’, Presidential Address, Australian Institute of Anatomy 1928.

Colin MacKenzie, ‘The Medical Importance of the Native Animals of Australia’, paper circulated for the information of Honourable Members by the Honourable the Chief Secretary, MacKenzie papers, National Museum of Australia.

The National Historical Collection is the core collection of the National Museum of Australia. Fewer than four per cent of the objects held in this collection are on display at any one time.

Most of the collection is kept at one of the Museum’s repositories in the northern Canberra suburb of Mitchell, where the objects are cared for by the Museum’s registration and conservation staff.

Objects offered to the Museum undergo rigorous assessment before they are accepted. During this process, curators, registrars and conservators consider how the object relates to themes, issues or people of national significance, its research value and its potential as an item for display.

The object’s condition, conservation qualities and originality are also considered, along with whether its origin and history can be thoroughly documented and authenticated. The Museum also maintains education and prop collections, and houses rare books as part of its library collection.

Registration and conservation

When an object is acquired by the National Museum of Australia – from any source – it goes through a detailed process of registration and conservation. Registrars ensure each object is properly described, recorded and housed.

Even with the aid of the latest computerised data entry and retrieval systems, keeping track of approximately 200,000 objects is quite a task. Conservators look after everything from paper and fabric to cars and computers, as well as the specialised field of bark painting conservation. This sometimes involves carrying out complex conservation.

The Bean car that Francis Birtles donated in 1929 was carefully taken apart and reassembled to working order. Other vehicles being conserved include Prime Minister Sir Robert Menzies’ official Bentley and a Crossley ‘Canberra’ – one of a fleet of 12 limousines shipped to Australia by their English manufacturers to transport the Duke and Duchess of York on the 1927 royal tour.

The ABC outside broadcast van was similarly conserved and actually used in 2000 to film the Queen’s visit to the Museum. Several of the Museum’s motor vehicles belong to the National Museum of Australia’s vintage car club and are driven at special rallies and other events.

Displaying objects

Conservators also advise curators and exhibition designers on how to display objects so that the least harm will come to them – the low light levels in many galleries, for example, ensure objects will not be damaged by visible-spectrum radiation.

To keep an object such as a stone artefact in good condition might mean no more than an occasional dusting, but other objects in the National Historical Collection require regular and more specialised care and attention.

The preserved biological specimens, including Phar Lap’s heart and specimens of Australian native animals in the MacKenzie collection, need to have their preserving fluid regularly monitored and occasionally replaced. The preservation of biological specimens such as the thylacine, one of the last specimens of this now extinct Australian animal, is of particular importance to all Australians.