presence

Update – the actuality of the archaeological past

by Michael Shanks

I have contributed little to this site Since 2016. I have been writing (Greece and Rome: a new model of antiquity [Link]), running experiments in fieldwork (Project Borderlands [Link]), exploring applied archaeology (with a host of organizations and corporations), asking questions of the proper role of the academic, the researcher, the scholar. In this contemporary…

materiality of the invisible

by Michael Shanks

Yesterday I had the great honor to open a remarkable exhibition of artworks at the Van Eyck Academie in Maastricht – multiform institute for fine art, design and reflection Curators: Lex ter Braak, Director of Van Eyck and Huib Haye van der Werf, Head of Artistic Program. The exhibition runs through The Van Eyck Academie, Marres,…

place/event – the Titanic (or not)

by Michael Shanks

Places are always associated with happenings – actualities, potentialities, imaginings, documented or not. place/event Here’s a variation. In 1935-6 the liner RMS Olympic was broken up at Jarrow on the River Tyne, and hotelier Algenon Smart bought the fittings from the First Class dining room for his hotel, the White Swan in Alnwick, Northumberland. The…

Model T Ford at the Palace of Fine Arts

by Michael Shanks

I was at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco this morning to welcome the arrival of the Historic Vehicle Association of America in their 1915 Model T Ford – culmination of a 3600 mile drive from Detroit following the tracks of Edsel Ford who made the same road trip a century ago. He…

history’s ruin – the case of an automobile

by Michael Shanks

This is one of a series of comments on the 8th biennial symposium “Connoisseurship and the Collectible Car” held at the Revs Institute for Automotive Research in Naples, Florida in March 2015. [Link] I’m in a workshop at the Revs Institute in Naples Florida, home of Miles Collier’s remarkable collection of cars and all things…