MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS: Comparing the two Scythian shows in NYC (12/17/00)

MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS: Comparing the two Scythian shows in NYC

by Motrja P. Fedorko

With the popularity of theme parks and computer-generated entertainment, museums are doing all they can to draw visitors into their galleries. Some museums are trying an interactive approach. The National Gallery of Art in Washington has computers set up so that visitors can take "virtual tours" rather than walk through the galleries that surround them. In Austin the Bullock Texas History Museum is promising to be nothing short of a Texas theme park. Many museums are catering to quick-serve popular culture in an attempt to gain visitors by satisfying the public's quest for instant gratification. The tradeoff, however, seems to be a diminution of their academic integrity.

Recently two exhibitions opened in New York City and are running concurrently. The subject is gold, Scythian to be exact, and the rightful heir for the moment need not be discussed. At the Brooklyn Museum of Art visitors can feast their eyes on "Scythian Gold: Treasures from Ancient Ukraine"; at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, "The Golden Deer of Eurasia: Scythian and Sarmatian Treasures from the Russian Steppes." The fact that a Scythian exhibition is hard to come by is easily noticed by the fact that the last one to visit these shores was in 1975. Today we are graced by two.

"Scythian Gold" was in the works for about five years, having been conceptualized in the mid-1990s. During this time, Dr. Ellen Reeder of the Walters Art Gallery visited Ukraine on a number of occasions, as did other members of her staff and the co-organizers from the San Antonio Museum of Art. In Ukraine, Dr. Reeder worked on documentation and background information for the exhibition. She also made an exceptional effort to include the Scythian pectoral. Unfortunately, to no avail. Due to its status as a historical treasure of Ukraine, the Ukrainian government would not permit that trophy to leave the country. Nevertheless, it was included in the exhibition catalogue to make a more comprehensive tool for study of Scythian works in Ukraine.

The exhibition opened in San Antonio on November 7, 1999, after which it traveled to The Walters Art Gallery and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. It is at the Brooklyn Museum of Art until January 21. Following its New York venue, "Scythian Gold" will travel to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, (February 18-May 6, 2001), the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Mo. (June 9-August 19, 2001) and the Grand Palais in Paris (September 25-December 31).

"Scythian Gold" at the Brooklyn Museum of Art is complemented by a catalogue of the same name consisting of 352 pages. There are nine essays ranging from a background piece on the Scythians and their culture, by Dr. Lada Onyshkevych to a piece on the gorytos and scabbard workshops by Michael Treister. The articles are written well enough to be grasped by the average museum-goer, yet documented meticulously so as to be useful for scholars and allied professionals. It is a weighty tome, aesthetically pleasing but too good to be a mere coffee table trophy. Besides its copious footnotes, it bears an impressive list of source material for the cerebral crowd. It points to 25 ancient sources and lists some 720 modern sources ranging from creaky ivory tower works to recently aired TV documentaries. It is a truly universal work, well thought out and executed for the full range of viewers who are likely to visit the exhibit. Most important, it is devoid of the Russophile nomenclature that still grips most establishments even nine years after Ukraine emerged from Russia's domination.

The essays are also a good reflection of the exhibition, making the book a cherished memento for those who view the objects. The highlights of the exhibition are Scythian gold objects found in Ukraine - the Sphinx Earring, the Gorytos Cover, the Helmet with Combat Scenes (excavated in 1988), the Cup with Horses (excavated in 1990), and the Finial (also excavated in 1990). The catalogue employs the Library of Congress transliteration system, consistently and properly. Geographical areas are transliterated according to their present political locations. Therefore, the capital of Ukraine is spelled Kyiv, transliterated from the Ukrainian, whereas a Russian author's last name is transliterated from the Russian, as Dashevskaia. Transliterating Ukrainian names from Ukrainian and Russian names from Russian shows a mastery of the obvious, no small accomplishment at a time when news media, industry and academia cannot seem to get a grip on the new reality.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, on the other hand, is presenting a larger exhibition. There are 212 objects discussed in their 303-page catalogue. The photography is beautiful. The catalogue, however, is a throwback to old Soviet promotional pieces. There are no footnotes using modern sources in the entire catalogue. The title, "The Golden Deer of Eurasia," may reflect the content of the catalogue and the exhibition, but the subtitle, Scythian and Sarmatian Treasures from the Russian Steppes," implies that the exhibition contains objects only from Russia, and that is not the case. Most of the objects are indeed from Filippovka on Russia's border with Kazakstan, but 18 objects were unearthed in Ukraine, and another four from Kazakstan. The vexing issue is that the objects from Ukraine are of major importance to the exhibit, centerpieces of sorts. Five of them have multiple photographs and/or details in the catalogue. These are not "Treasures from the Russian Steppes." The Comb with Battle Scene, excavated in Solokha Kurhan, Dripropetrovsk Oblast, Ukraine, is illustrated five times in the catalogue, appears on the back cover of the catalogue, and is repeatedly seen in advertisements and in reviews of the exhibition. The Comb with Battle Scene also appeared in the New York Times article on October 13 comparing these same two exhibits. The Gorytos probably made from the same matrix, or mold, as the Gorytos of the Brooklyn exhibition is also from Ukraine, as are the two vessels, which have four pages of details in the exhibition catalogue. Obviously there is no argument with using these objects in the exhibition, however, it seems the Metropolitan Museum of Art should present them for what they are.

The issue of credibility leaps at you at every turn of the page. In the "Note to the Reader," it states "a slightly modified version of the Library of Congress system of transliteration of modern Russian ... has been used." This caveat gives rise to all sorts of curiosities. The capital of Ukraine appears as Kiev and all other Ukrainian place names are transliterated from Russian.

Especially confusing is the map. For centuries maps have been used as navigation tools, not just by sailors and soldiers, but also by teachers as tools to help students and colleagues navigate through heaps of place names and the geometry of their placement in time and space. When well-prepared, they are a potent tool that puts dates, places and dynamics of history into easily comprehensible format. It is often the clincher for a novice. The two-page map on page xiv-xv is anything but the above. At first glance, the areas labeled in capital letters appear to be present-day countries: Kazakstan, China, Syria, to name a couple. The heart of ancient Scythia, Ukraine is nowhere to be found, but its appendage Crimea figures prominently on this "aid." Mesopotamia is labeled, as is Bactria. So where lies the key to this exposition? Is this a map contemporary to the exhibit. Is it a composite overlaying the contemporary with the current? It is wrong and misleading on both counts. There is a paucity of documentation and a skimpy bibliography.

During an interview, Joan Aruz, the editor of the catalogue, gave little background information on the exhibition or the publication. Dr. Aruz underscored that "The Golden Deer of Eurasia" was proposed and researched by the Russians. She was uncertain about the approximate year work began on the project and stated that the Metropolitan Museum of Art was unaware of the Brooklyn Museum's "Scythian Gold" exhibit. There are no other venues scheduled for this exhibition. Judging from the scanty information made available, it seems the Metropolitan scraped this exhibition together in haste and is not very forthcoming with its efforts.

Neither exhibition is perfect. It is devastating that the Brooklyn exhibition lacks the crown jewel of excavated Scythian artifacts, the spectacular Pectoral. The Metropolitan's shortcomings are far more serious. They are principal and eat at the heart of an institution's charge. For all their efforts, museums should remember that they are not merely warehouses for artifacts. They are trustees of the most important artifacts of culture and history. As trustees, their responsibility is to preserve, promote and facilitate the study and research of the artifacts in their trust. How they bear that responsibility speaks to the credibility of the entrusted institution. The preservation of that credibility is not merely for the benefit of their current exhibits but for the preservation of trust. Neglect violates the faith placed in them by their founders and benefactors. The responsibility is ongoing, an investment in perpetuity. To fulfill that responsibility, many museums allocate a significant percent of their budget to research and scholarship. These same standards need to be maintained when a prominent institution places its imprimatur on a visiting exhibit. In this case, it seems that the only purpose of the Russian-inspired show at the Metropolitan Museum of Art was to take the shine off the Ukrainian exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. It is a sad example of an august museum fawning to the interests of a fading political star.

Motrja P. Fedorko was exhibition assistant for the "Gold of the Nomads: Scythian Treasures from Ancient Ukraine" exhibit at The Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore.

She is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh with B.A. cum laude degrees in art history and anthropology (1994), with graduate course work at George Washington University in art history and museum studies, and a certificate in Russian and East European studies from the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in Ukraine.

As researcher and exhibit assistant, Ms. Fedorko has been affiliated with The Frick Collection in New York, the General Services Administration in Washington and The Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, among others. She has also been involved in archaeological fieldwork in Ukraine, excavating sites in Crimea and Poltava.

Currently, Ms. Fedorko is assistant registrar at the The Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas at Austin.

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