On a treasure hunt in the museum
Museum für Naturkunde Chemnitz: A 291 million year old love story - exhibition tour on 23 February, 5.30 pm
On Thursday, 23 February at 5.30 pm, the Museum of Natural History Chemnitz invites interested parties to a special kind of exhibition tour entitled "On a treasure hunt in the museum". Based on his successful "A wie Anbändeln" programme at the Chemnitz State Museum of Archaeology, exhibition host Martin Gerner would like to lead curious people not only through the museum, but also to each other.
And there is no shortage of sensual pleasures: The programme begins with a glass of sparkling wine and ends two hours later with South American volcano cake.
Admission is free of charge. Registration is requested at naturkundemuseum(at)stadt-chemnitz.de.
"On a treasure hunt in Chemnitz" was the title of the first scientific excavation by the Museum of Natural History, which ran from 2008 to 2011 in Chemnitz-Hilbersdorf. Among the fossil treasures that the palaeontologists were able to recover were two scorpions of the new species Opsieobuthus tungeri - the first fully preserved scorpions from the Permian period worldwide.
Investigations by the international research team showed that the biggest difference between the two specimens was the size and shape of the chemosensory comb organs, a feature that still enables the differentiation between male and female scorpions today. As scorpions are actually solitary creatures that only come close to each other during the mating season, a fossilised love story is the most likely explanation for this double find from Chemnitz.
The new exhibition intervention shows the original fossils alongside reconstructed models and modern-day scorpions and provides information about the find and the biology of scorpions. It was designed in collaboration with the naturalist working group at the Museum für Naturkunde Chemnitz.
The nature-loving girls and boys were able to try out various museum jobs. As curators, designers, mediators, scientists, taxidermists and visitor service staff, they embarked on a joint search for topics.
In several workshops, they worked on a long list of questions such as: Why does a scorpion have a stinger and why the claws? Why are scorpions arachnids? How can you tell whether a scorpion is male or female?
After intensive technical work, the young curators wrote texts, the designers collected and created images, and finally the presentation was prepared together.