The exhibition was held at Scarborough Art Gallery from October 2022 to February 2023. However, it can be viewed as a virtual tour on desktop or mobile. The tour includes a selection of highlights from the exhibition including video, sound and text. Click the bottom right image to view the From Local to Global tour.

Introduction

A wealthy landowner and big game hunter, Colonel James Jonathan Harrison (1857-1923) of Brandesburton Hall, Yorkshire spent his extensive leisure time travelling the British Empire and beyond, hunting animals for pleasure and to fund his lifestyle.

After his death, his widow gave his collection of taxidermied animals, diaries, photographs, gramophone recordings and objects obtained on his travels to Scarborough Corporation. In the 1950s, the collection moved to the Wood End Natural History Museum and was absorbed within the museum’s collection.

Scarborough Museums and Galleries, like other organisations in this country, has benefitted from colonialism. The donation of the Harrison collection is one example of this. A collection like this can act as a springboard to explore multiple perspectives, some that have always existed, but have been marginalised by British colonial thinking.

This exhibition explored his collection as a new, dynamic archive. It did not follow the conventions of a traditional museum display that tells the ‘story’ of Harrison or focuses on themes. Instead, it recognised that this archive is an unfinished project, with multiple strands and layers.

Accessibility

Audio descriptions
There are audio files of the exhibition panels. These can be accessed here:
Listen to the audio descriptions of the panels on SoundCloud.

Virtual Tour
The exhibition can be viewed as a virtual tour on desktop or mobile. The tour includes a selection of highlights from the exhibition including video, sound and text.
View the From Local to Global tour.

Please Be Aware: the exhibition explores a collection of objects that contain images and descriptions of racial exploitation. We have included this material because it helps us to better understand British attitudes towards race that come from colonial past. We have tried to approach this material sensitively, but visitors may find some elements upsetting.

The exhibition contains:

• Taxidermy animal specimens

• Ivory including hippo and elephant tusks

• Archive objects including diaries, photo albums and pamphlets

• Oil paintings

• Objects on loan - letters, a camera

• Artworks created by Ila Colley, Andrew Dodds, Interstruct Collective and Errol Francis. Find out more about this on this here: Artist Commissions web page.

• One film on a large screen with subtitles

• One film on a large screen with subtitles and headphones

• One slideshow of images projected on a large screen.

• A sound booth. This a curtained space with headphones to access a playlist of sound recordings. Once the curtains are closed, the space is dark.