Treasures on display at museum

A hand-written recipe for gingernuts from the original Griffin’s factory, the Chez Eelco sign, and the windows from the Trathen’s Department Store are just some of the local treasures featured in the Nelson Provincial Museum’s latest exhibition.

‘Morimoritia Ngā Taonga Tuku Iho | Treasured: Objects of Mana and Significance’ opened this week and runs until July.

It offers a rare glimpse of the treasures the museum holds on behalf of the people of Nelson and Tasman.

Museum chief executive, Lucinda Jimson, says there are more than 78 individual objects on display in the exhibition, drawn from the over 200,000 in their collection.

“Knowing what has passed, and keeping memories in the form of significant objects, is one of the key functions of a museum,” she says.

“We received the Griffin’s recipe/costings book from local historian Warwick Johnson last year. He had collected the material from the Griffin’s Lower Hutt factory when it closed in 2008.”

The Chez Eelco sign along with his small archive was donated in 2008.

Medals that tell the story of a World War One heroine, and a cloak gifted to a Riwaka local a few short years before he became Prime Minister of New Zealand, Keith Holyoake, are some of the other treasures on display.

Lucinda says the Museum has worked closely with iwi and the Tongan community to tell the story of their taonga in their own words.

“It was important to us that whānau wrote the text to accompany their taonga. We are also exceptionally proud that this will be our first fully-bilingual exhibition, with all labels in both English and te reo Māori”.

Lucida adds that as well as local treasures, visitors will be able to see a range of internationally significant objects held by the museum.

“There are paintings by old masters, Chippendale furniture, a bone ship made by prisoners in the Napoleonic wars, and even a balaclava from the Russian punk protest group, Pussy Riot.”

‘Morimoritia Ngā Taonga Tuku Iho | Treasured: Objects of Mana and Significance’ is on at the Nelson Provincial Museum from 6 April - 9 July (closed Good Friday). You can find out more about the exhibition at www.nelson museum.co.nz