５、Exchange between an art museum and a natural history museum through the interpretation of a work of art or a specimen.

 

Akira TAKAHASHI

Museum of Nature and Human Activities, Hyogo

 

The specimens of various natural objects are kept in a natural history museum, where the scientific meanings of the specimens are studied, and the results are exhibited and explained. Although the specimens usually have a peculiar beauty made by nature, it is rare to focus on the beauty of the specimens and to be exhibited in a museum. On the other hand, although an art museum has many works featuring some natural objects as a subject, usually the natural objects are not explained in detail. When the work of art deals with natural objects, a curator or researcher of a natural history museum can try to explain the work from the viewpoint of natural science. On the other hand, it is also an interesting endeavor that the curator of an art museum explains the beauty formed by nature. It seems that exchanging specimens and works of art and providing explanations to each other between the museums of art and natural history brings about interesting results. I would like to introduce an example which I performed in an art museum related to interpreting pictures from the field of botany.