Exhibitions acknowledging sexuality have become more frequent in museums, but most have focused on recent histories. The Warren Cup: Sexuality in Ancient Greece, which closes this month at the British Museum, provides insights into the more distant past.
In 1999 the British Museum acquired a Roman silver cup for £1.8m. It was made early in the first century AD and is known as the Warren Cup after its first modern owner EP Warren. Other Roman silver drinking vessels survive, but this one is unique because it is decorated with two scenes showing two men making love.
Objects reflecting sexuality have often been omitted from displays. From the mid-19th century until the early 1950s the British Museum kept objects that had sexually frank subject matter (more than 1,000) in the museum 'Secretum'. Other forms of censorship were used elsewhere, but ignoring aspects of history or culture that some people may find challenging should not be an option for museums.
Many of these types of objects are now openly displayed. Whether they are always used to best effect is debatable. The scenes are often ignored and the object reduced to just a representative, the interpretation doesn't speak about people then, or communicate to people now.
Since it was acquired, the Warren Cup's home has been Room 70. Surrounded by other great treasures, it is doubtful whether many people noticed the cup. The approach has been to keep the object in the past.
The Warren Cup: Sexuality in Ancient Greece exhibition represented a new approach. It gave the cup a prominent location near the main entrance as the centrepiece of a display where a small number of objects were used to illustrate ancient attitudes towards sexuality.
As a result, the cup had a greater impact. The interpretation explicitly raised questions that have previously been ignored. For example, how did the ancient Greeks and Romans view sexuality and same-sex relationships?
Unusually for an exhibition of classical material, the display made explicit links with the present day and also highlighted how other cultures have responded to love between men.
Approaches like this, that make connections between sexualities in the past and present, and answer the questions visitors are likely to ask, should offer an effective approach to engaging wider interest. They will also help redress decades of omission.
It will be interesting to see how the lessons from this exhibition are applied to the display of the cup in the permanent galleries and to other objects that reflect attitudes towards sexuality in the collection.
It is essential that museums continue to find effective ways of linking the past and the present. Sexuality is a subject that can re-personalise the past. The era of the active 'secret museum' has been over for some time, but how many museums still have material related to the history of sexuality that isn't effectively integrated within permanent displays or interpreted meaningfully?
Stuart Frost is a gallery educator at the Victoria and Albert Museum. This article expresses his personal opinion
In 1999 the British Museum acquired a Roman silver cup for £1.8m. It was made early in the first century AD and is known as the Warren Cup after its first modern owner EP Warren. Other Roman silver drinking vessels survive, but this one is unique because it is decorated with two scenes showing two men making love.
Objects reflecting sexuality have often been omitted from displays. From the mid-19th century until the early 1950s the British Museum kept objects that had sexually frank subject matter (more than 1,000) in the museum 'Secretum'. Other forms of censorship were used elsewhere, but ignoring aspects of history or culture that some people may find challenging should not be an option for museums.
Many of these types of objects are now openly displayed. Whether they are always used to best effect is debatable. The scenes are often ignored and the object reduced to just a representative, the interpretation doesn't speak about people then, or communicate to people now.
Since it was acquired, the Warren Cup's home has been Room 70. Surrounded by other great treasures, it is doubtful whether many people noticed the cup. The approach has been to keep the object in the past.
The Warren Cup: Sexuality in Ancient Greece exhibition represented a new approach. It gave the cup a prominent location near the main entrance as the centrepiece of a display where a small number of objects were used to illustrate ancient attitudes towards sexuality.
As a result, the cup had a greater impact. The interpretation explicitly raised questions that have previously been ignored. For example, how did the ancient Greeks and Romans view sexuality and same-sex relationships?
Unusually for an exhibition of classical material, the display made explicit links with the present day and also highlighted how other cultures have responded to love between men.
Approaches like this, that make connections between sexualities in the past and present, and answer the questions visitors are likely to ask, should offer an effective approach to engaging wider interest. They will also help redress decades of omission.
It will be interesting to see how the lessons from this exhibition are applied to the display of the cup in the permanent galleries and to other objects that reflect attitudes towards sexuality in the collection.
It is essential that museums continue to find effective ways of linking the past and the present. Sexuality is a subject that can re-personalise the past. The era of the active 'secret museum' has been over for some time, but how many museums still have material related to the history of sexuality that isn't effectively integrated within permanent displays or interpreted meaningfully?
Stuart Frost is a gallery educator at the Victoria and Albert Museum. This article expresses his personal opinion
