Museum in Egmore

I had already told two friends that I would go for a photo walk this weekend and share pictures with them. But unable to figure out where to start the walk from, I decided to visit the Museum in Egmore. The lady at the ticket counter asked me for Rs450 – ticket cost 250 and 200 for taking pics. Final cost was 215 as she was convinced I am an Indian. The ticked handed over was just a piece of paper torn from a booklet made of reusable paper [appeared so] and instead of printed text, she had written with pen the entry fee of 15 and 200 for using still camera.

The first stop was the contemporary art gallery. None of the exhibits attracted me, except that for the life size portraits of Lord this and Duke that from the erstwhile British era. The lighting arrangement was horrible so could not take pics – and actually didn’t see any point of capturing the Lords and Dukes in my camera. I was a little disappointed and thought perhaps paying 200 was a waste.

Next to the contemporary art gallery is a monument which apart from the ornamental work at the entrance does not indicate of any architectural marvel overall. I skipped exploring it at first and headed for the Children Museum.

I must say, this is the best section in the entire museum campus. The exhibits provide a glimpse of the people belonging to the different regions within India and people from other geographies. It also has a collection of models showing different civilizations of the past era. And there's one section which displays many objects that have been, and can be created with paper.

The second floor has the basic scientific stuff for kids – equally interesting.

Out from the Children Museum, I thought of taking a shot of the solitary monument in the campus. So I was back at the entrance of the monument I has just sort of ignored. The wooden doors are closed and a board hangs on it which reads something like, ‘Notice: This building is in damaged condition. Visitors are advised not to walk or sit near the building’. One-I could not see any damaged portion anywhere. Two: there were lots of people sitting near it.

I moved away from there after reading text engraved in two marbles placed on either sides of the entrance. Left side: The stone commemorates the opening of the Victoria Memorial Hall by HE The Hon Sir Arthur Lawley CCIE KCMC on march 23rd 1909. Right side: This foundation stone of the Victoria Memorial Hall was laid on 24th Jan 1906 by His Royal Highness George Frederic Ernest Albert, Prince of Wales PC KG KT KP GCSI GCMG GCIE CCYO

I wish I knew what those acronyms meant for them and the common men like the visitors. I have observed Docs and Army personnel using acronyms with their name – MD, MS or PVC, MVC, MC – two or three at the most – but Mr Albert must have done much more to be bestowed with so many titles!

One technical inaccuracy that I observed was the placement of the two marbles – the announcement of foundation on RHS and the VMH declared open on the LHS. Someone should have swapped their placement. Or I guess, placement of such stones with this kind of info is correct – I used my simple logic – 1906 should be followed by 1909. Whatever!

The museum area also houses the Connemara Library. My colleague Balaji R spoke at length about the library – biggest and best. I did not explore the place beyond 1st floor. I am not sure if it has that big hall kind of area which is generally shown in movies. The library also has an area which exhibits books for people to buy – I think its called Permanent Book Fair. This section has more books for Tamil readers.

The Bronze gallery of the Museum is quite interesting and has a huge collection. I have never seen so many bronze sculptures together in any other museum. If the thousands lights that illuminate the area and the different statues are switched off or strategically placed, one can take better shots of the deities. While the ground floor has collection of lesser known gods [lesser known to me], the first floor has this exclusive collection of Kaali and Natraja. The collection is amazing; worth seeing over and over again. I particularly liked the different forms and poses of Natraja, kaali, and RudraKaali. I don’t remember the name of the other gallery where I went. Half of it appeared nothing less than a big bio lab – hanging skeletons of various animals; bottled reptiles; large, medium, small tortoise; stuffed animals; interestingly a skeletons of a man and a horse together – seemed the master and his horse died together; and then a skeleton of a whale. The jaw bones of the whale was stuck on either sides of the 7 or 9 feet long door – you can imagine how big would be the whale’s skeleton if the jaw bones are that big.

The same building/gallery also had skulls of different animals and another section has engraved stones with strange decorative languages. The best site was when I peeped inside a room which was all dug up for some kind of renovation. This room had three statues and one of them being near to a place dug deep, with mound of dug up earth nearby, was wrapped neck downwards with some banner-type makeshift cover.

In my last round of the museum, I heard some opera kind of music coming from a room. I peeked inside and was thrilled to see the most sophisticated looking covered amphitheater. Down in the stage area were people putting up a banner for the 6:30 pm show of western classical music. In the second row I saw a young girl sitting and out of curiosity I asked her what was all this about. She told me about the show at 6:30 and that I could join [free pass], and that she was a participant – had been practicing for 2 months. I have always wanted to witness an opera show, but that would be in Vienna. Was interested to attend this one too, but it was 2 PM and I wondered what would I do for 4.5 hrs. So was out of the museum after wishing her good luck, and also took down the telephone number of the organizer.