I was totally delighted when the @V_and_A announced an exhibition on bags. For reasons #materialculture types in particular know, in the last two years I have been fascinated with #shopping bags and #knitting bags: vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/ba… My former employer, @michiganstateu Museum, has a lovely collection of nearly 300 "designer" paper #shopping bags dating back to the famous @Bloomingdales bags of the 1960s. Here's a wonderful post about Bloomingdale's bags from @cooperhewitt: cooperhewitt.org/2016/05/04/the…

I am not sure we will ever be able to process the loss of Brazil's #MuseuNacional. It's not only a loss of specimens, documents, artifacts; it's the loss of future discovery and knowledge, not only by scholars examining the collection but by visitors sating their curiosity. /1 Many people consider #museums "attics"--the @smithsonian, for example, is the US's "national attic." When a museum sells a "beloved" artifact there's always a hue and cry about it. Think, for example, of Eakins' "The Gross Clinic" and the recent case of the Berkshire Museum. /2