An Art Book Documents the Losses of Museum Fires

What happens when a museum is reduced to ash? What stories fade away when the last remaining relics vanish? Who is to chronicle these lost eras, these long-forgotten times? These are some of the questions that Sahil Naik raises in his book The Bird, A Bone, And Other Witnesses of a Museum Fire.

But to call The Bird, A Bone, And Other Witnesses of a Museum Fire a ‘book’ is a misnomer. Produced by Roli Books with Prameya Art Foundation and Emami Art this is not a book bound within a seam. Instead, it is an art project in itself. The official name given to it might be Artist’s Book, but ‘Portable Exhibition’, ‘Mobile Gallery’ might be more apt. This is a work of both investigation and documentation, memory making and remembering.

Naik’s starting point is the fires that ravaged the National Museum of Natural History, New Delhi, and the Zoology Department of Ballygunge Science College, Kolkata, in 2016. The artist makes the important point that these two fires were responsible for a loss of natural history not seen outside of war. “This book,” he writes in the Introduction, “Contemplates how stories correspond with objects and can truly instil ideas of care and empathy to these dead-alive objects.”

The National Museum of Natural History was an icon of Delhi. The grey building located at Mandi House was a place of wonder and intrigue. Here one could see million-year-old fossils and bones frozen behind dusty vitrines. It was here that one could marvel at a 160-million-year fossilised bone of the enormously long-necked Sauropod Dinosaur. It inspired awe not just for its size but also its age and the histories that it held. The fire destroyed this bone. But now, thanks to Naik’s efforts we have a digital painting of it. Thanks to Naik we can now reckon with the loss by seeing once more this ‘dead-alive’ object. In connection with dinosaurs, one might be startled to learn that a village in Gujarat houses the third largest dinosaur hatchery in the world, as Naik informs us. Over 1000 dinosaur eggs and bones were discovered here.

Another fascinating story housed in the book is of the pink-headed duck. This duck formerly occurred in eastern India, Nepal, Bangladesh and northern Myanmar, but is now probably extinct. The museum held a rather eerie taxidermic model of the bird complete with bulging eyes and smeared feathers. A few avid birders and adventurers claimed to have caught sight of the bird in the wild, but there is little proof of this. Naik gives us a much more aesthetic version of the bird with his deft strokes and sharp vision.

By following the journey of artefacts that once dwelled in the museums, Naik tells us the stories of the rhinoceros, the dodo and white tiger, to name just a handful. While these are interesting, as a ‘reader’ of the book one can find them a tad random and disjointed after a point.

While the idea of having an ‘exhibition in a book’ is interesting, it overlooks the essential difference in the two mediums. An art exhibition is much more expansive than a book can ever be. Art on the walls allows a viewer to glimpse many works at the same time. The viewer can then choose to walk towards a particular work and give it her entire attention. The turning of pages does not replicate the same experience. One might find oneself flipping pages trying to grasp a larger narrative, that seems just out of reach. Given the essentially linear and immersive structure of a book, one is always trying to draw connections and join dots and when that doesn’t happen, one’s attention is likely to waver and shift.

But in totality, The Bird, A Bone, And Other Witnesses of a Museum Fire has interesting nuggets, fine artwork, and does the important job of documenting lost histories and forgotten stories.

a Boneand Other Witnesses of a Museum Fireart booksbooksMuseum FiresSahil NaikThe BirdWeb Exclusive