Item HT 59159 Exhibition Label - Indian Elephant, National Museum of Victoria, Melbourne circa 1940

Summary

Early printed, single-sided exhibition label for the National Museum of Victoria, circa 1940.
It accompanied a disarticulated skull of a young Indian Elephant and is an exact copy of the previously hand typed label it replaced from circa 1905.

Physical Description

Rectangular sign, black printed on sepia card with 5mm fading around edges where frame perhaps was previously.

Significance

The labels in the Historic Exhibition Labels Collection illustrate the changing styles in didactic interpretation, aesthetics and approaches to audience engagement throughout the history of Museums Victoria. From the earliest days of the National Museum of Victoria in the mid 1800s through the various incarnations of the Applied Sciences collection through to the amalgamation of all the branches into Museums Victoria, the labels chart a course through the changes in audience needs and desires in Victoria and across the museums' various sites. There are beautiful examples of hand written nineteenth century labels, some examples of extremely long didactic panels from the early twentieth century, and rare and unusual fonts in the mid twentieth century. The collection also illustrates the transition from hand-written labels to the use of typewriters, then lettera set and ultimately printed labels, culminating in the large format digital print room being introduced at Melbourne Museum in 2000.