This blog post is special in the sense that it is a nearly direct translation of a description written for the Pwevo mask, which is part of the UNESCO collections from Zambia. The description takes us all the way from Moesgaard Museum’s exhibition ‘The Lives […]
Hats: A World Tour
Around the world, humans have covered their heads for various reasons. Sometimes to protect themselves from the heat of the sun or the falling snow. Some wear a particular headgear on an everyday basis while other kinds of hats are used only on special occasions. […]
The familiar strange and the strange familiar: Warding off all evils with the help of a CD
Scrolling through the ethnographic collections allows you to enter into a whole world of objects – from ant-belts, spirit houses, machetes, masks to musical instruments, dolls, camel saddles and even more. But among the more ‘fantastical’ objects in the collections are also some seemingly ordinary. […]
Where there’s tea there’s hope
English playwright Arthur Wing Pinero said that ‘where there’s tea there’s hope’. In many societies, drinking tea is a social event; sometimes even a ritual; something to gather around, something that organises the day, a tradition, a cultural practice. And around the globe, tea is […]
Gaining Strength with Ant Bites
It is early spring in Denmark, and the tricky changing temperatures mean that people run the risk of getting yet another cold. Getting a cold often means staying in bed and many people drink mug after mug of hot chamomile tea with honey until their […]
Egg hunting in the Ethnographic Collections
The tradition of hunting for eggs as a celebration of Easter is older than I thought. I had always assumed that hunting for eggs was another Anglo-American scheme to make more money on capitalising on holidays. The tradition goes back to 1700’s Netherlands, where children […]
On Garments and Gender
When my son was 4 years old, he loved to dress in skirts. Reactions from the surroundings varied a lot: from the daycare assistant who laughed and said he was funny, to his great grandfather who exclaimed that skirts were for girls only. Not to […]
Poo-poo, Pee-pee and… Reindeer Lichen! Fighting Environmental Threats with Ethnographica
Ethnographic objects inspiring state-of-the-art green innovation? Indeed! Inspired by objects from our Sibirian collections, Moesgaard Museum launches an innovative and sustainable solution to an immense challenge for the planet, namely the excessive use of disposable diapers. Over the recent 30 years, disposable diapers have become […]
An impermanent artefact: The sand mandala
These days, a splash of colour has been added to the view from the railing around the central staircase at Moesgaard Museum. Looking down, our visitors will be met with the splendid colours and intricate details of a Buddhist sand mandala. During a week in […]
Drinking the bitter root: The mato oput bowl
Sometimes these days, I feel like the world is a mess. We are fighting over ridiculous things, and not focusing enough on what matters. Pardon me for the Game of Thrones reference, but it feels like we are living through the War of the Five […]
A collection of treasures and stories: Randi Dæhnfeldt’s collection
I have always found the phenomenon of ‘the collector’ immensely fascinating. Perhaps because I am a bit of a collector myself… I have saved every cinema ticket since seeing The Waterboy in 1998, and am the proud owner of a splendid rock (actual rocks, not […]
Death wearing feathered shoes: Aboriginal khutaitchi
Here is a truly curious pair of shoes. They are so-called khutaitchi shoes, made by a sorcerer or magician of the Central Australian Pitjantjara tribe. In traditional Aboriginal beliefs, there is no such thing as a natural death, which means that there is usually an […]
