Museums – Past & Present Podcasts

John Watson, Curator of Musical Instruments and Conservator of Instruments, discusses the Foundation’s organized piano, which first belonged to the St. George Tucker family.

What was in George Washington’s wallet? Long before the establishment of a standard American currency, there was trade, barter and credit. How were these financial activities handled with the myriad coins and metals in circulation?

Rare and beautiful silver forms share the social history of their users and their makers. Visit “A Handsome Cupboard of Plate,” an exhibit open now at the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg.

A new blog launching March 3 follows the restorative conservation of a rare survival: an organized piano. A piano combined with a pipe organ, this unique instrument towered at nine feet tall and seven feet wide. Its restoration raises questions at every step. Repairing a broken element could mean erasing a piece of the object’s […]

London’s foundling children were orphans in the midst of a crowded city. The exhibit Threads of Feeling tells their stories, as well as those of their mothers.

Painters and Paintings of the Early American South is a new exhibit focusing on the interrelatedness of Southern artists and subjects. See it at the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg.

A 130-year span of keyboard instruments documents a revolution in colonists’ musical tastes. See the progression in “Changing Keys,” a new exhibit at the Museums of Colonial Williamsburg. Curator John Watson describes the outlay.

Setting the table for a 200-year old dinner takes research and clever re-creation. Antique plates and platters bear historic foods in dining settings that reflect the season and the host. Curator Amanda Keller works with a team from the museums to lay out authentic feasts.

Old-fashioned fire engines had to do much the same jobs as today’s, but they relied on classic physics and plenty of manpower. Curator Erik Goldstein describes the fire engine at the center of a new exhibit at the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg.

Museum conservators wage daily battle against 10 agents of decay. Exhibit Curator Emily Williams outlines the plan of attack in “Conservation, Where Art and Science Meet.”

Objects rare and poignant joined the Colonial Williamsburg museum collections in 2009. Chief Curator and Vice President for Collections, Conservation and Museums Ron Hurst describes the finds.

Foreign tools and family treasures came to America like stowaways in immigrants’ baggage. Trish Balderson retraces migration’s story through museum objects.

Tangible expressions of grief keep lost loved ones close. Curator Kim Ivey explains the customs of mourning art.

Modern-day curators focus on reversible restoration techniques. Conservator Shelley Svoboda describes the renewal of the Carolina Room.

Fakes and phonies are stopped with a squint. Curator John Davis discusses the subtleties of form.

Good as new isn’t always as good as old. Curator John Watson talks about conservation at Colonial Williamsburg.

Dragons, mermaids and griffins lurk in the museum collections. Christina Westenberger leads the hunt.

Curator Erik Goldstein describes the antecedents of modern coinage in a new exhibit at the DeWitt Wallace Museum.

Vice President of Collections and Museums Ron Hurst says refreshed exhibits and gallery spaces make two of Colonial Williamsburg’s museums warm, welcoming, and inviting.