Skådesamling och åskådlighet

Abstract

An investigation of the exhibition of a natural history museum opened in Göteborg 1923 indicates two different ways of understanding. Emphasizing the picture in the entrance room of Adam among the animals in the Garden of Eden the exhibition might be regarded from a Christian point of view. In accordance with this view the exhibition could also be seen as a representation of the "chain of being", which unites all living things into a hierarchy reaching from the most minute organisms by way of every possible stage to God. On the other hand the exhibition contained elements of interest in the perspective of the theory of evolution such as varieties of different species, mimicry among insects and evolution of flat-fishes. Although there was no chronological perspective the exhibition might be looked upon as an illustration of the evolution, from the "low" to "high" developed animals. The main issue is how the two different meanings — the Christian and the evolutionary — could coexist in the same exhibition. Another question is what it was, that constituted the attraction of the evidently quite popular exhibition. The author proposes that the explanation of both questions is, that museum exhibitions are a visual medium, which the visitors take in primarily by intuition. The picture of Adam and the animals of the paradise are not the premises of a logical conclusion. They might instead give rise to different questions of philosophical nature of interest both to the Christian and the agnostic.