Throughout the British Museum, and other museums all over the world, there are handling desks, also called hands – on desks or hands – on sessions. Here, volunteers sit with real objects, not replicas, and explain the history of the object, its context, its relation to present day, its place in the gallery, its link to the community/country it originates in. If the volunteer is a good storyteller then s/he can keep you captivated for a really long time 🙂
This is probably the best part of a museum’s interpretation programme, wish we could have more museums in india understanding the value of interpretation!!!
In this series of photographs, Mark, a Chinese origin volunteer born in Kolkata, explained 4 objects in the South Asia gallery of the British Museum.
VarnikaDesigns 
If India gets to start this story telling counter at museum will gladly volunteer someday …in Japanese too if required for Japanese tourists 🙂
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Oh, wow! To be able to touch these objects, or even see them without a barrier is incredible! Museums, in their role as guardians, so often become restrictive– I’d love for this to happen everywhere. To feel with your have the texture and contours of a sculpture, to pour over a painting… Oh, you have me dreaming!!!
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