MEL FISHER MARITIME MUSEUM TO LOAN GOLD ARTIFACTS TO AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY IN NEW YORK
A gold salver from the sunken Spanish galleon Margarita from the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum’s collection of artifacts will be on loan to the American Museum of Natural History’s new exhibit entitled “GOLD” in New York City beginning in November.
The gold salver is one of the 1622 fleet’s most rare and valuable artifacts, a prime example of renaissance elegance manufactured in the Americas during this period. In addition to the gold plate, a gold bar and chain and a Venetian gold ducat coin from the Mel Fisher collection will also be on loan.
The exhibit brings together examples of this prized and rare element in the latest in a series of exhibitions on precious and semi-precious metals at this major national museum. Visitors to the exhibit can explore the unique properties of gold.
“Having museums like the American Museum of Natural History request to borrow Mel Fisher collection artifacts is a testament to the prestige and interpretive value of the artifacts that we collect and the work our staff is doing in restoring artifacts from the colonial era,” Mel Fisher Maritime Museum executive director Dr. Madeleine Burnside said.
She also noted that this also illustrates the importance of preserving artifacts from shipwrecks. “Shipwrecks are like time capsules that give us snapshots of an era,” Burnside added.
In 2004 the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York displayed one of a kind artifacts provided by the Mel Fisher Museum for an exhibit on the Colonial Andes, specifically tapestries and silverwork.
The Mel Fisher Maritime Museum is an independent, not-for-profit 501 c (3) organization that has been nationally-accredited museum by the American Association of Museums. The Museum is dedicated to the exhibition, archaeology, preservation and research of our maritime history in the New World.
