I’m Victoria Leachman, Rights Adviser at Te Papa. Thanks to support from National Services Te Paerangi and Creative Commons Aotearoa New Zealand I’m going to be on the road around the country in March. I’ll be talking with staff from heritage institutions about copyright, collections, and Creative Commons. If you’re aRead more
My role at Te Papa revolves around creating opportunities for our visitors to engage with Te Papa content. I was part of the team that developed the DeClassified exhibition, which you can check out on level 3 at Te Papa. This exhibition has an additional interpretive layer which enables people toRead more
Do albatrosses have personalities? And if so, how do scientists measure such intangible characteristics? This blog provides some of the background to research Te Papa scientists were involved in, examining how birds use their environment, and how individual personality traits of these birds can be measured. The previous blogs on thisRead more
New Zealand has an amazing diversity of seabirds. Around 1/3 of the worlds 348 species are found in New Zealand waters, with a high number of endemic and threatened species among them. Te Papa has a long-term research programme on Westland Petrels, a species that nests in the coastal cliffsRead more
This morning Te Papa farewelled the exhibition of tukutuku panels which are to be installed at the United Nations Headquarters in New York early next year. The woven panels, which have been on display at Te Papa since July, were commissioned by former Minister of Māori Affairs Dr Pita SharplesRead more
Today we’ve been hearing about the most recent addition to Te Papa’s scientific collections, a new colossal squid Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni. We’re playing host to a dozen or so media representatives as well as our own live-streaming film crew, who are following intently the activity of five visiting squid scientists fromRead more
Back in July, students from Makara Model School had the chance to meet some Te Papa curators and get a ‘behind the scenes’ look at part of our Natural History collection store. This opportunity came about as part of Science Live: Expedition Snares Island that was broadcast earlier in the year. ByRead more
Kia ora koutou Last month I gave a talk at a TedX conference in Tauranga where I discussed some of the research I’ve undertaken as part of our exhibition development project here for an exhibition about Gallipoli (due to open April next year at Te Papa). I’ve been very busy assemblingRead more
Dr Simon Nathan is an Honorary Research Associate at Te Papa. During his research towards a biography on James Hector, the founder of the Colonial Museum, he has delved into the household accounts of the Hector family, which are held in Te Papa’s Archive. In this guest blog post, he shares some of his findings onRead more
The galleries may be closed, the walls may be bare, but there has been plenty going on behind the scenes in preparation for the fresh season of Ngā Toi│Arts Te Papa due to open on Friday 22nd August. Many of the works destined for exhibition have required some lovingRead more
This week we are changing over a number of garments in The WOW Factor, an exhibition celebrating the wonderful, creative and inventive World of WearableArt™. The exhibition itself has been extended to 2 November 2014 so that this year’s show attendees can also enjoy seeing a number of garments up closeRead more
In late March, Te Papa hosted 20 young aspiring authors and illustrators for a sleepover. Held in association with the New Zealand Festival Writers and Readers Week, the sleepover celebrated the launch of The Curioseum: Collected Stories of the Odd and Marvellous edited by Adrienne Jansen and published by TeRead more
An enduring frustration for museum curators is being aware of objects or specimens that have little or no acquisition or collection data. This, sadly, is often the case with our oldest natural history specimens. A specimen without data is almost worthless – while an old specimen with good data isRead more
Yesterday marked a huge day of commemorative activity in Tauranga to signify the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Pukehinahina /Gate Pā, and here in Wellington, Te Papa also contributed to the commemorations. The museum flew a replica of the Gate Pa flag from its main flagpoles to acknowledge theRead more
Victoria University of Wellington’s International Institute of Modern Letters is justifiably famous. One of its innovative creative writing courses goes by the intriguing acronym of ‘CREW352’. CREW352 is creative science writing. Recently, CREW352 student Nina Powles interviewed Dr Susan Waugh, Senior Curator of Sciences at Museum of New Zealand TeRead more
