My Return, and The V&A

First off, I apologize for not posting in over a month and a half. This is the beginning of a new spate of entries, most of which will have to do with the trip I took in April. This one will not. But it’s a start.

Two days ago, I went to the Victoria and Albert Museum, which I wasn’t all that excited about on the way there. Why would I go, then, you might ask? Well, it was to see a tiger. There was apparently a 19th century automaton of a life-sized tiger eating a soldier, complete with the growls of the tiger, and the cries of the man. This description was consistent. Two guidebooks I saw, as well as the website for the museum itself described the piece as such. So, I figured it would be worth a visit to what I had essentially heard was a museum of clothing and fashion, and therefore pretty boring to me.

I was wrong. On many counts. First of all, the tiger was not, as was insinuated by the description, functional. Nor was it life-sized. But the first bit annoyed me more. Why spend so much time writing about the noises it made, if you couldn’t hear them? It was just sitting behind a glass case, next to some swords and kimonos. You could tell it had moving parts, but that was about it. I understand that it’s probably either broken or about to fall apartif they use it, but they could maybe restore it, and make it go once an hour or something. (In the British Museum, there was an awesome clock in the shape of a ship, that rolled down a table and fired cannons and such. But it said right on the card that it was no longer functional. And that was okay with me. Because they communicated.) So, I was disappointed in Tippoo’s Tiger.

But I was sincerely awed by the museum. It’s gigantic, and in a beautiful building. I wandered around the café for about five miinutes, getting awkward looks from the patrons while staring at the stained glass windows with sayings from literature about drinking inscribed in them. There were carvings all over, and an incredible green space in the middle (where I sat and had a pretty mediocre brownie). There was art all over, and not just in the cases. A cool mechanical clock hung over the entrance, next to a big blown glass scupture by an artist I know I know but couldn’t think of (no label, of course).

And it wasn’t just clothing. There was a long hall of sculpture, and a really massive room filled with plaster casts rich guys from the 17th-19th century made of famous things, including Trajan’s Column, which was gigantic, and had to be cut into two pieces for it to fit in the room. There was also a massive collection of asian and middle eastern art (and clothing, which I cared less for). Yes, there was a large fashion section, and a lot of stuff that I wasn’t too excited by, but there was certainly enough that I was.

My favorite part actually was the ironwork section. The museum, or most of it, was organized by material or use—there was an iron section, a silver section, a theatre section, a ceramic section, etc. etc. A lot of the ironwork was just a lot of gates, which weren’t all that interesting, but then I came across a room filled with locks and keys. These were really cool, and ranged from the 1500s (and earlier?) to the present day. They were of all sorts, and you could see just how complicated they were, and how much skill had gone into them that we really don’t see anymore, because locks are more functional than anything else. I did sort of have the tiger issue with this display, however. There was one lock described as a “puzzle padlock,” and the description card detailed how these studs on the front had to be arranged in a certain way for the key to be released, and how if this one thing was turned in a certain way, the lock would never lock except if a different button was pushed and… Well, it was pretty useless without seeing it in motion. There were a lot of the locks, actually, that sort of needed replicas to play with, in order to understand the true craftmanship that went into them.

The building was also pretty much a maze. Going around on the upper floors, you would come across a balcony, and then look down and see that you are actually in a room you were in before, just further up. Corridors doubled back, and around, and you ended up somewhere completely different than you thought you were going to. Added to this is that, although it is listed as having 6 floors on the map, they’re really just half floors, so they go in and out of each other all over the place.

I really enjoyed the museum, and spent much too long there. I now know that it’s not just fashion, and I’m certainly planning on going again at some point, on a later trip. There’s a musical instrument section that was closed, and I want in. That, and other bits that were closed, or not opened yet, or I just didn’t have time for.