Siberian Crafts Conservation
The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) is a fantastic place to explore arts and crafts from around the world. The Museum is home to 33 million specimens and artifacts. Behind what you can see on display are conservators working to preserve and restore items that have been acquired by the Museum.
Screen grab from AMNH's The Guts and Glory of Object Conservation
The video The Guts and Glory of Object Conservation, below, showcases conservators preserving items from pre-Soviet Siberia.
Over 500+ items from pre-Soviet Siberia were collected by two teams of anthropologists who were on the AMNH-backed Jesup North Expedition from 1897 to 1902. The teams - an American team and a Siberian team - went up opposite sides of the Bering Strait along Siberia, Alaska, and the northwest coast of Canada. The purpose of the Expedition was to figure out who came over the Strait, and when.
· Don't miss: American Baskets, American Crafts, and Nalbinding.
Recently, 100 of the 500+ items brought back were chosen for full conservation treatment at the Museum, funded by the Stockman Family Foundation Trust. Among the pieces chosen are robes made from fish skin, jackets made from walrus intestines, containers made from birch bark, and coats made from reindeer hide.
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The curators and conservators had to figure out what materials the items were made from, and then develop a plan to mend, repair, and preserve them.
The Museum collaborated with native Siberian groups in the preservation process, and then made a trip to share information about the pieces with the Siberian community.
Native Siberian scholar Vera Alexseyevna Solovyeva was a key link in the conservation process:
“This collection’s very important because it has, probably, the most elaborate collection in the whole world about our peoples’ pre-Soviet period. It has…the full range of the material and spiritual culture...When Soviets came to power they tried to erase the memory of people…they destroyed all items that belonged to the shamans, that belonged to the rituals. When the Soviet Union collapsed, indigenous people started to have interest to revitalizing their culture and their spirituality.”
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See AMNH's Collaboration between AMNH and Siberian Scholars for more information, and for a link to their video Shamans of Siberia.
Screen grabs from AMNH's video The Guts and Glory of Object Conservation.
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