Tucked next to the grandeur of Booloominbah House, where graduations are held on Armidale’s University of New England campus, a post-shower rainbow leads me to the newly reopened Museum of Antiquities (UNEMA). This uniquely curated temple of antiquities reopened on Valentine’s Day after a closure of five years thanks to a global pandemic and a local tornado. In October 2021, the supercell event that destroyed much of the northern end of UNE’s academic campus also took with it the museum’s refurbishment funding.
Australia’s only regional antiquities museum once welcomed 5000 visitors a year and curator Dr Bronwyn Hopwood hopes it will now entice even more after its renovation glow-up that she managed to salvage through persistent grant writing and determined fundraising. In front of a creative reimagining of the famous second-century BC ‘Unswept floor’ mosaic, Bronwyn tells me, “I wear two hats. I teach Roman history and museum studies while also curating and managing the antiquities museum.” Pointing to the innovative wall mosaic she says, “I’ve been obsessed with Roman history since watching the BBC’s production of ‘I Claudius’ as a child. I also loved reading the works of historical novelists Rosemary Sutcliff and Mary Stewart. Attending Hurlstone Agricultural High School in the 1980s, I studied every unit of ancient and modern history they offered, before completing an Arts/Law degree with double honours at the University of Sydney in the 1990s. So, yeah, happily obsessed with history.”
Starting a PhD at the University of Sydney in 1999, Bronwyn put both undergraduate degrees to good use examining the property and inheritance rights of Roman women from the second century BC to the first century AD, while also working as a legal verifier for the Law Book Company and casual teacher at St Andrew’s Cathedral School, Sydney. In 2003 Bronwyn joined UNE as an Associate Lecturer in Roman History, and was awarded her doctorate from Sydney in 2005. Entranced by the 3000 artefacts in UNE’s antiquities museum, when the opportunity to join UNEMA’s governance committee arose in 2016 Bronwyn jumped at the chance. She was later appointed honorary curator in 2018 and then collections manager in 2020. The role is a challenging and rewarding one covering everything from issues of ethical collecting and social inclusion, to collections management, conservation, digitisation, education, exhibitions, financial management, fundraising, grant writing, job-ready training, and public outreach.
“I see UNEMA’s role as a public custodian of its magnificent collections,” she says. “Our mission is to support teaching, research, and community interest in the history of peoples through the ages, and we must keep asking ourselves why are we collecting and conserving the particular objects in our care?”
One doesn’t have to look far to see at least one answer to that question.
“Ancient history is a detective story, for which you can physically examine some of the clues,” she says. “Students can investigate history at the museum through the process of physically handling the objects, feeling their form, weight and texture, and learning to read the symbols and imagery captured on their surfaces.”
Understandably, one of the most popular items on display for school children is a mummified Egyptian foot, but this is one of several objects that is strictly protected from handling. Bronwyn herself has been very hands-on with the refurbishment, both designing and installing the displays, as well as a tactile wall with braille signage for the visually impaired, thereby making the most of the filament 3D printers that were acquired as part of a successful research grant.
“Let me show you a few of my favourite things,” she says, opening the door to the museum’s ‘Mediterranean Lands Gallery,’ which houses the Classical Antiquities collection.
“Nothing lasts forever and artefacts do not like humidity, light or temperature changes, which is why we have upgraded the air-conditioning, installed U.V. film on some of the display cases and replaced all the lights with LEDs,” she says.
Like a proud mother, she pulls out a voluminous photo album full of ‘before’ pictures of the museum, now unrecognisable in the sleek black, brightly illuminated display cabinets that grace the museum. In her quest for flexibility and sustainability, Bronwyn installed black recyclable paper-furniture stools, resembling petite Greek columns, that can be easily reconfigured to host the dozens of local school groups, university classes, and other visitors that the museum attracts.
“Visitors are surprised to discover that UNEMA is home to the nationally significant collection of Prof. James and Eve Stewart,” she says.
Both were trained archaeologists with a passion for Cyprus. After internment in a German POW camp in WWII, James became Australia’s first Professor of Middle Eastern Archaeology and the first Australian archaeologist to lead an international dig. “Our Stewart collection contains objects spanning Cyprus’ Stone, Bronze, Iron, Byzantine and Medieval eras.” Gesturing to her left, with the air of a seasoned tour guide, Bronwyn points out ‘Object One’ – the first treasure collected by the museum in 1959. It is an elegant Cypriot amphora, or vase from 750-600 BC, displayed on a rotating stand inside its glass case. Its perpetual motion is an example of what Bronwyn sees as, “the flexibility we now have to slot objects in and out to keep the displays fresh and diverse.”
“Pretend you’re on a boat going around the Mediterranean coastline, visiting in turn the Ancient Near East, Cyprus, Egypt, Greece, and Italy…” This journey has been brought to life by Bronwyn and the museum’s volunteers who have created a free app called “Discover UNE.” The app contains audio guides describing the life and times of the objects. These replace the lengthy text descriptions that once cluttered the displays.
We pass by a few of her most beloved finds; a squat duckling-shaped Cypriot baby feeder and, more gruesomely, a second-century AD Roman surgical kit complete with tonsil remover. She points out a trio of Roman glass ‘juglets’ from the third century AD, the size of small pepper grinders and explains how rainbow-like iridescence might provide clues about their origins within the Roman empire.
“I love that we have the bitsiness of Roman culture displayed here – we’ve got nails and fishhooks and everyday lamps as well as the most delicate glassware and even a terracotta water bottle (ampulla) with gladiators on it,” she smiles. “The Romans were also very good at stealing ideas from others and making them better,” she says. “For example, glass was a luxury item until the Romans worked out how to inflate it. They went on to mass-produce glass items thereby making them much cheaper and more widely available.”
Now that the museum is open, Bronwyn’s plans for the future are optimistic; “Phase 1 – build a museum, Phase 3 – world domination! All I have to do is work out what’s Phase 2,” she laughs.
And while adoring the antiquities, Bronwyn equally wishes to communicate how our present high-technology society is steeped in the ancient world. With the help of local street artist CRISP, Bronwyn has succeeded in seamlessly melding old and new in ‘Automata Alley,’ an exhibition about ancient, medieval, and modern robotics, prosthetics, and entertainment. Artefacts intermingle with artist’s impressions and working models recreating myths and machines such as Sisyphus pushing his boulder uphill, the Antikythera mechanism, and a defecating duck, to explore the origins and ethics of today’s technology. The exhibition is completed by animations and augmented reality (AR) floating on the screen of one’s phone at the quick scan of a QR code. A life-size 3D-printed prosthetic version of Michelangelo’s ‘Hand of God’ is included with more serious intent.
“I plan to give students STEM training opportunities by getting them involved in the 3D-printing of prosthetic hands as part of a program connected to a broader international movement known as “eNable.” We’ll start working with the kinetic hand developed by Australian engineer and philanthropist, Mat Bowtell, and build from there.”
Bronwyn says that by expanding the work of museums beyond collecting artefacts to producing them, museums can be, “even more useful. An estimated 40 million people need prosthetics and we can be involved in making them. We are not just saying, ‘look at the important stuff we have!’ Now we can help make useful stuff!”
A wonderful sense of humour pervades the reopened museum. This is perhaps nowhere more apparent than Bronwyn’s solution to an offending chip vending machine that threatened to encroach on the museum’s display area – she simply incorporated it into ‘Automata Alley’ to become part of the museum’s empire. With the museum successfully reopened, she can now focus on running work experience and volunteering programs, and the development of a future course in Museum Studies.
Bronwyn has been hugely successful in putting together the pieces of her fragmented museum. She has even been immortalised as a LEGO figure by the classicists society “BCE” (Brick Classicists Empire), a project that combines pop-art and history to engage with the ancient world and the people inspired by it. In contrast to Roman glass, Bronwyn’s LEGO figure has not been mass produced. Like her contribution to keeping the ancient world alive in regional Australia, it is truly unique.
Portrait photography Matthew Cawood | Museum photography David Rose
