Ancient Artifacts: The Penn Museum Online Exhibits

The Penn Museum, which is a part of the University of Pennsylvania's campus, is one of those dusty old museums that contain some really interesting hidden gems.  How much you enjoy the museum depends on your level of patience - are you willing to shuffle through display cases that haven't changed much in fifty years?  If not, you might dismiss this as just another dry scholar's museum.  But if you do take the time to look closely at everything, you might find yourself pleasantly surprised.  The museum is now trying to show the world how interesting it can be through a few online exhibits, though I'm not sure how well they're succeeding.

There are ten exhibits you can browse on the Penn Museum's website, but for some reason the presentation of these exhibits isn't at all consistent.  The best allow for 3D viewing of objects in the collection and the exhibit halls they reside in.  Some also have interactive maps showing where University of Pennsylvania teams unearthed featured artifacts.  And some do a good job of linking the objects shown in these exhibits to the content of the physical museum's permanent displays.

But these positive aspects really only hold true for three exhibits:  The Real Story of the Ancient Olympic Games, The Ancient Greek World, and Egypt:  A New Look at an Ancient Culture.  The other seven exhibits leave something to be desired.  They tend to be long-winded, featuring long blocks of text interrupted only by a sparse few images.  Some take a rather too familiar tone, using a voice that seems much too casual and colloquial for exhibit content.  And one exhibit, The Real Me:  Therapeutic Narrative in Cosmetic Surgery, read like a very long Vanity Fair article slapped up on the web in a tiny blue font.

Over all, the online exhibits are pretty disappointing.  Compared to other physical museums that put content on their website, the Penn Museum is sorely lacking.  It seems strange that such a well-respected museum would neglect consistency and the curatorial voice, not to mention an element of enjoyability, in their online museum presence.  I do hope they get around to sprucing up this content, and soon, or they risk coming off as just another stuffy university museum.


The Penn Museum Online Exhibitions
Website:  www.penn.museum/online-exhibits.html