Portal:Museums

This portal is being considered for deletion in accordance with Wikipedia's deletion policy.

Please discuss the matter at this page's entry on the Miscellany for deletion page.

You are welcome to edit this page, but please do not blank, merge, or move it, or remove this notice, while the discussion is in progress. For more information, see the Guide to deletion.

Portal topics: Activities; Culture; Geography; Health; History; Mathematics; Nature; People; Philosophy; Religion; Society; Technology; Random portal

Introduction

The Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino in Santiago, Chile

A museum is an institution dedicated to displaying and/or preserving culturally or scientifically significant objects. Many museums have exhibitions of these objects on public display, and some have private collections that are used by researchers and specialists. Museums host a much wider range of objects than a library, and usually focus on a specific theme, such as the arts, science, natural history or local history. Public museums that host exhibitions and interactive demonstrations are often tourist attractions, and many attract large numbers of visitors from outside their host country, with the most visited museums in the world attracting millions of visitors annually.

Since the establishment of the earliest known museum in ancient times, museums have been associated with academia and the preservation of rare items. Museums originated as private collections of interesting items, and not until much later did the emphasis on educating the public take root. (Full article...)

Selected museum

The Icelandic Phallological Museum (Icelandic: Hið íslenzka reðasafn [ˈhɪːð ˈistlɛnska ˈrɛːðaˌsapn̥]), located in Reykjavík, Iceland, houses the world's largest display of penises and penile parts. As of early 2020 the museum moved to a new location in Hafnartorg, three times the size of the previous one, and the collection holds well over 300 penises from more than 100 species of mammal. The museum also holds 22 penises from creatures and peoples of Icelandic folklore.

In July 2011, the museum obtained its first human penis, one of many promised by would-be donors. Its detachment from the donor's body did not go according to plan and it was reduced to a greyish-brown shriveled mass that was pickled in a jar of formalin. The museum continues to search for "a younger and a bigger and better one."

Founded in 1997 by since-then retired teacher Sigurður Hjartarson and now run by his son Hjörtur Gísli Sigurðsson, the museum grew out of an interest in penises that began during Sigurður's childhood when he was given a cattle whip made from a bull's penis. He obtained the organs of Icelandic animals from sources around the country, with acquisitions ranging from the 170 cm (67 in) front tip of a blue whale penis to the 2 mm (0.08 in) baculum of a hamster, which can only be seen with a magnifying glass. The museum claims that its collection includes the penises of elves and trolls, though, as Icelandic folklore portrays such creatures as being invisible, they cannot be seen. The collection also features phallic art and crafts such as lampshades made from the scrotums of bulls.

The museum has become a popular tourist attraction with thousands of visitors a year and has received international media attention, including a Canadian documentary film called The Final Member, which covers the museum's quest to obtain a human penis. According to its mission statement, the museum aims to enable "individuals to undertake serious study into the field of phallology in an organized, scientific fashion." (Full article...)

Did you know...

... that the lobby of Wenzhou Museum includes Kuafu chasing the sun and Chang'e flying to the moon?
... that King Mohammed VI of Morocco donated part of his royal collection to the new National Jewellery Museum?
... that the firm of Israel Sack supplied American antiques to leading private collectors and museums, including the Winterthur Museum, The Henry Ford, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art?
... that the British Museum's 2012 exhibition Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam included textiles from the Kaaba that were described as bringing "a visceral artistic buzz to the display"?
... that the divers who found the c. 9th-century Tully Lough Cross in 1986 were convicted for trying to sell it to American museums?
... that The Citi Exhibition: Manga at the British Museum was the largest exhibition of manga ever held outside Japan?

Get involved

For editor resources and to collaborate with other editors on improving Wikipedia's Museums-related articles, see WikiProject Museums.

Selected images

Image 1The Louvre in 1853 (from Museum)
Image 2The Nantong Museum, the first Chinese-sponsored museum (from Museum)
Image 3Visitors examining fossils displayed at the National Museum of Iran in Tehran, Iran (from Museum)
Image 4Classic cars displayed at an automotive museum, which could be considered both a history and technology museum (from Museum)
Image 5Exhibit planning (from Museum)
Image 6Officials blamed a lack of funding for a 2018 fire at the National Museum of Brazil that destroyed over 90% of its contents (from Museum)
Image 7Museum textile storage includes rolled storage racks, hanging wardrobe and garments shelving, and cabinets. (from Museum)
Image 8In museums, paintings, framed and unframed, are normally hung on sliding or fixed racking. (from Museum)
Image 9Collections storage for three-dimensional historic artifacts. (from Museum)
Image 10Moai figure at the British Museum (from Museum)
Image 11A curator and exhibit designer dressing a mannequin for an exhibit (from Museum)
Image 12An honours board listing the directors of a museum in Auckland, New Zealand (from Museum)
Image 13Construction of Titanic Belfast in 2010 (from Museum)
Image 14A guided tour group at the Soumaya Museum in Mexico City, Mexico (from Museum)
Image 15Workers rallying at the Philadelphia Museum of Art (from Museum)
Image 16Paintings arranged in groupings in the "salon style" (from Museum)
Image 17Archive Processing rooms provide a space for archivists to arrange and describe archival materials to make them accessible to researchers. (from Museum)
Image 18An exhibition of the remains of Native Americans at the Royal Ontario Museum in 1908 (from Museum)
Image 19The old Ashmolean Museum building in Oxford, England (from Museum)
Image 20Restoration of a gilded mirror by a conservator (from Museum)

Selected type of museum

USS *Wisconsin* is one of four *Iowa* class battleships opened to the public as a museum (berthed at Nauticus in Norfolk, VA)

A maritime museum (sometimes nautical museum) is a museum specializing in the display of objects relating to ships and travel on large bodies of water. A subcategory of maritime museums are naval museums, which focus on navies and the military use of the sea.

The great prize of a maritime museum is a historic ship (or a replica) made accessible as a museum ship, but as these are large and require a considerable budget to maintain, many museums preserve smaller or more fragile ships or partial ships within the museum buildings. Most museums exhibit interesting pieces of ships (such as a figurehead or cannon), ship models, and miscellaneous small items associated with ships and shipping, like cutlery, uniforms, and so forth. (Full article...)

Subcategories