[NHCOLL-L:5520] RE: museum displays

[Bryant, James]

I would think pure, clean sand is archival, especially for exposure to many types of fossils and matrix, but sand can be prohibitively heavy, and depending on the fossils and their state of preservation you may have other, very specific issues (relative humidity, potential pyrites disease, migrating salts, other chemical instabilities, etc.). From an aesthetic point of view, it is interesting to see how some museums have recently installed large mounts of vertebrate fossil skeletons. In its Age of Mammals exhibit, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County used slices of various forms of decorative rock (mostly marble, it appears at a distance) as the platform for many of their mounts. Very elegant, I think....

James M. Bryant

Curator of Natural History

Museum Department, City of Riverside

3580 Mission Inn Avenue

Riverside, CA 92501

(951) 826-5273

(951) 369-4970 FAX

jbryant at riversideca.gov


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-nhcoll-l at lists.yale.edu [mailto:owner-nhcoll-l at lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Judith Nagel-Myers
Sent: Friday, June 17, 2011 6:12 AM
To: nHCOLL-L at lists.yale.edu
Subject: [NHCOLL-L:5519] museum displays

Hello all,
I am looking for an archival quality solution to use in display cases in exhibits.
We are searching for something, which is of archival quality, with the properties of sand or gravel.
What do you use in your displays?
Thanks for your help
Judith

--
--
Dr. Judith Nagel-Myers
Collections Manager
Paleontological Research Institution,
affiliated with Cornell University
1259 Trumansburg Road
Ithaca, NY 14850

Ph:   (607) 273.6623 x 28
Fax:  (607) 273.6620