The Neuchâtel Museum of ethnography
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| The history of collections belonging to the Neuchâtel Museum of Ethnography
(MEN) dates back to the eighteenth century. The first items, given to the City of
Neuchâtel in 1795, came from the General Charles Daniel de Meuron Cabinet of natural
history. After being moved and divided several times, ethnographic artifacts were transferred to the Saint-Nicolas hill, in the villa donated by James-Ferdinand de Pury, where the MEN was established and inaugurated on July 14 in 1904. A building designated for temporary exhibitions, its north wing decorated by Hans Erni's mural painting Les conquêtes de l'Homme (Man's Conquests), was erected in 1954-1955. In 1986, a new construction was inserted between the two previous ones, thus allowing the expansion of University's Institute of Ethnology. Even though they are financially separated, the two institutions complement each other well. They share the same library and are occasionally involved in joint initiatives. Today the MEN houses some 30'000 objects, half of which come from Africa: East and South Africa, the 30's in Angola, Sahara and Sahel (the Tuaregs and the Moors); Gabon. It also contains Asian, Eskimo and Oceanian collections, non-European musical instruments and items from the ancient Egypt.
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Cuirasse.
Esquimau. Région du détroit de Béring, Alaska. Huit plaques d’ivoire de morse et
une plaque d’os de baleine reliées par des lanières de cuir. MEN VI.193. Don Alfred
et Antoine Borel, 1882. |
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Neuchâtel Museum of ethnography
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| A garden gnome next to a Fang mask and a tin of peeled tomatoes, a
pair of Elvis Presley’s boots, a Nkisi statue plunging into a bath, transparent Pepsi
on a washing machine, a pirate from Tintin in the Soviet Union, a disco in the
land of voodoo, Spice Girls lollipops, Barbie noodles – all of that and lots more has
been presented at the MEN for the temporary exhibitions entitled Objets prétextes,
objets manipulés, Les ancêtres sont parmi nous, Le trou, Si…,
Marx 2000, Pom pom pom pom or Derrière les images. Such exhibitions propose to the visitors an original reflection about a set of themes tightly connected with the reality and put into perspective by the ethnological view, implicit and distant at the same time. These exhibitions bring in equally the here and the everywhere, the prestigious and the banal, the hand-made and the industrial, as well as many signs of a complex and culturally oriented reality. In such a framework, the objects are not exposed for themselves, but because they are inserted in a discourse, because they are becoming arguments of a history that is putting into perspective one or another of their characteristics, be they esthetic, functional or symbolic. Occasionally qualified as criticizing or destabilizing, such a process aims at allowing the visitors to put into perspective their perceptions, to deconstruct their knowledge, to question their certainties and to think over their reality.
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| Esquimau
géant. Suisse. Sagex, laque, bois. MEN 99.20.1. Réalisé par JPZ et son équipe. Glace enrobée qu’on tient, comme les sucettes, par un bâton, l’esquimau est couramment consommé à l’entracte par une bonne partie des cinéphiles de la société occidentale. La mégalisation présentée ici évoque le pop art qui, avec Oldenburg, Rosenquist et Warhol a mis en évidence les travers de la société de consommation et la fascination qu’elle exerce. Posé dans un lieu ethnographique, il souligne la difficulté d’attribuer les objets à des catégories étanches relevant exclusivement des beaux-arts, de la marchandise, de la manufacture, de l’art populaire, du sacré ou du profane, de l’exceptionnel ou du quotidien. |
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