Stairs, plastics and cables litter the floor, vinyls to be affixed, marks on the walls, exposed ceilings, display cases still empty and others sealed with pieces. It is the prelude to the Dinasties exhibition. The first Reigns of Europe’s Prehistoric era, the Alicante Archaeological Museum’s next venture after bidding farewell, just a month and a half ago, to the Xi’an warriors. Only a week remains until it opens to the public on March 26, and MARQ is moving at a breakneck pace to have everything ready for visitors.
“It may look like there is still a lot to do, but a lot has already been completed. The big, the most challenging part—the arrival of the pieces—is already in place; now it is about dressing the space,” notes Manuel Olcina, MARQ’s technical director. He explains that in every MARQ exhibition there is a substantial amount of work behind the scenes. The previous show had to be dismantled and this one assembled in a race against time, yet the teams respond well.
Exhibitions at MARQ are planned years in advance, and the actual preparation, which includes contacting museums, requesting pieces, and coordinating collaborations, typically extends more than a year before opening. “In the past, an archaeological exhibition involved placing a piece in a vitrine with a panel and that was it. Today, exhibitions are evocative and immersive, and the aim is for the audience to enter, understand, and feel the significance of the objects,” Olcina remarks.
The design of the exhibition—curated by János Danis (Déri Museum, Debrecen, Hungary), José Antonio López Padilla, an archeologist at MARQ, and Roberto Risch from the Autonomous University of Barcelona—falls to the Ilicitan studio Rocamora, a firm renowned for its architecture, design, and museography and previously honored for the warriors’ exhibit.
In the preliminary stages of the installation, Toni Pérez visited to learn firsthand about MARQ’s storage spaces where technicians work and to witness the preparations of the new proposal. He also had the chance to admire numerous treasures, including a gold diadem dating to 2000 BCE from Portugal, along with bracelets, necklaces, vessels, swords, and axes among other objects.
“We will travel back to Europe’s prehistoric kingdoms, to the earliest European realms, to the Bronze Age, 4,500 years ago, in an exhibition that involves 20 museums across Europe and where 500 objects will be on display, some of which have never before been exhibited in Spain or together,” stated the MARQ official, who called the assembly of Dinastías a “major undertaking” that demonstrates the museum’s strong collaboration and high technical capability in a one-of-a-kind show that will run until October 13.
Arrival of the pieces
Pieces have been arriving at MARQ over the past two weeks following a protocol that functions like an assembly line: “They arrive by special transport, coordinating many European and Spanish museums with special routes. The pieces are unboxed in the presence of couriers, the museum delegates who verify arrivals, and they are moved to vitrines. Once secured in their final place, the pieces’ handling ends, and responsibility rests with the museum,” Olcina explains.
All but one
As of this Wednesday, the last communications from Villena Museum, the Museum of Art and History of Brussels, and the State Museum of Prehistory in Halle were still circulating. MARQ now houses all pieces except one: the Gold Hat of Schifferstadt (Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany) from the Palatine History Museum–Speyer, which is set to arrive this Friday.