|
|
|
Exhibition Reviews
Kym S. Rice and Benjamin Filene
Contributing Editors
Introduction
The contributing editors encourage readers to suggest representations of history in American public culture that might be reviewed. In addition to continuing coverage of museum exhibitions, they are interested in covering living history projects, historical pageants and reenactments, memorials, historic preservation projects, and virtual museums. Please contact:
| Kym S. Rice |
Benjamin Filene |
| Museum Studies Program |
Department of History |
| George Washington University |
University of North Carolina, Greensboro |
| 2035 F St., NW |
P.O. Box 26170 |
| Washington, DC 20052 |
Greensboro, NC 27402 |
| <kym@gwu.edu> |
<bpfilene@uncg.edu> |
We would like to thank the American Association for State and Local History for providing information on the work of its members.
|
"Clash of Empires: The British, French & Indian War, 1754–1763." Organized by the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania, 1212 Smallman St., Pittsburgh, PA 15222-4200.
Traveling exhibition, May 1, 2005–April 23, 2006, Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center, Pittsburgh, PA 15222; May 18–Nov. 12, 2006, Canadian War Museum, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1R 1C2; Dec. 15, 2006–March 15, 2007, S. Dillon Ripley Center, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC 20560. 6,300 sq. ft. Scott Stephenson, curator; David Halaas, project director; Eisterhold Associates, exhibition design; Gerry Embleton, models; Fred Anderson, consultant.
Clash of Empires: The British, French & Indian War, 1754–1763. By R. S. Stephenson. (Pittsburgh: Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center and the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania, 2005. ix, 108 pp. Paper, $14.95, ISBN 0-936340-13-4.)
Internet: description of the exhibition, photographs, membership information <www.pghhistory.org> (March 7, 2006).
|
|
Winston Churchill called the Seven Years' War the first world war, but any visitor to the exhibition "Clash of Empires" will quickly grasp another truth: it was also the first media war. It generated an explosion of images meant to commemorate battles, honor their winners, merchandise images, and manipulate public opinion. From the heroic paintings of Benjamin West to the commemorative kitsch of souvenir china to the humble art form of powder horn carving, the artifacts prove that war, even in the eighteenth century, was a process of image making. CNN did not invent war theme songs and logos. |
1
|
|
"Clash of Empires" is the result of events that have created an international buzz about the 250th anniversary of the French and Indian War, as the conflict was known in North America. In the 1990s, an Allegheny regional tourism organization took the lead in promoting and coordinating the commemorative efforts of an assortment of historic sites, organizations, and museums in the Pittsburgh area. One of those, the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania (HSWP), had already identified the French and Indian War as a topic important to its mission, although surveys found that only 4 percent of the public was aware of the story. In 2001, as the HSWP decided to go ahead with an exhibition anyway, the organizers were serendipitously approached by the free-lance curator Scott Stephenson, who had been working on the topic—as the project director, David Halaas, put it in an interview—"since he was eight years old." Stephenson pitched an ambitious project that would assemble the largest collection of French and Indian War artifacts ever mounted. The HSWP, never known for a lack of ambition, thus became the anchor institution of an international exhibition that succeeds brilliantly in dramatizing one of the pivotal stories of North American history. |
. . . |
There are about 675 more words in this article.
Please log in (or, if you are not yet an
authorized user, please go to the
User Setup page) to gain full access rights. Or if you're already logged in register your subscription.
|
