Jim Naughten, Objects in Stereo

In November 2022, Wellcome Collection will present ‘Jim Naughten, Objects in Stereo’, a new exhibition by British photographer Jim Naughten, inviting visitors to look closely at museum objects usually hidden from view. Using the 19th-century technique of stereoscopic photography, which makes two-dimensional images appear three-dimensional, ‘Objects in Stereo’ reminds us of the complex relationship between seeing and understanding materials in museums’ collections.

Commonly, up to 90 per cent of a museum’s collection is not exhibited. Most items are not on public display due to the sheer numbers of items cared for, with some on loan, studied by researchers or considered too delicate to display. Naughten’s photographs will invite visitors to focus close attention on some remarkable objects in storage, revealing their intricacy and fragility, as well as showing visible traces of collections care. Using specially created stereoscopic viewers, visitors will have the illusion of three dimensions, showing objects in beautiful detail and providing a different experience of seeing photographs and engaging with this material. 

For ‘Objects in Stereo’, Jim Naughten visited Blythe House in west London which, until its recent closure, was home to a wide range of objects from the collections formed by Henry Wellcome and on long-term loan to the Science Museum Group. One of the last artists to access the building and the collections stored there, Naughten has created images that will offer a glimpse of objects not usually displayed in public. ‘Objects in Stereo’ will present visitors with a new perspective into the practice of keeping a collection and asks questions about what it means to keep and care for museum objects.

‘Objects in Stereo’ will remind us of the complex relationship between seeing and understanding materials in museums’ collections. Alongside the stereoscopic photography, there will be large-scale photographic views into the storerooms themselves, revealing the architecture of the building, and of museum storage itself. They will show relationships between individual objects in store, and question how these kinds of spaces might shape our encounters with them.

Blythe House was built around 1900 as a headquarters for the Post Office Savings Bank and later acquired by the government as a storage facility for the British Museum, the V&A and the Science Museum Group. In 2015 the government announced its closure, and these museums are in the process of moving their collections to new, purpose-built storage facilities.

At the same time as Blythe was built, Henry Wellcome and his museum staff created a collection of around one million objects, artworks and material from around the world broadly related to health. At the time, these were classified and displayed according to Eurocentric ideas, reinforcing colonial hierarchies and prejudices. After Henry Wellcome’s death in 1936, most items were dispersed to other collections worldwide. In the 1970s, Wellcome Trust loaned the Science Museum Group 120,000 medicine-related objects based on Western ideas of medicine and its histories. Since then, collection objects have been displayed at the Science Museum and cared for in storage at Blythe House. Photographs of some of these stored objects will be presented in the exhibition.

Jim Naughten is an artist exploring historical and natural history subject matter using photography, stereoscopy and painting. He was awarded a painting scholarship to Lancing College and later studied photography at the Arts Institute of Bournemouth. Naughten’s work has been widely featured in exhibitions across Europe and the US, including solo shows at the Imperial War Museum, Horniman Museum, and group shows at the Royal Academy of Art and National Portrait Gallery in London.

‘Jim Naughten, Objects in Stereo’ is curated by Emily Sargent and Ruth Horry. It opens to the public on 24 November 2022 until 23 April 2023 and is free to visit.

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Notes to editors

Visitor information

• ‘Jim Naughten, Objects in Stereo’ opens in Gallery 2 from 24 November 2022 – 23 April 2023.
• Admission to Wellcome Collection is free.
• Opening hours: Tuesday to Sunday 10:00 to 18:00 and Thursdays 10:00 to 20:00, closed Mondays.
• Address: Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Road, NW1 2BE.

About Wellcome Collection

Wellcome Collection is a free museum and library exploring health and human experience. Its mission is to challenge how we all think and feel about health by connecting science, medicine, life and art. It offers a changing programme of curated exhibitions, museum and library collections, and public events, in addition to a café. Wellcome Collection publishes books on what it means to be human, and collaborates widely to reach broad and diverse audiences, locally and globally.

Wellcome Collection actively develops and preserves collections for current and future audiences and, where possible, offers new narratives about health and the human condition. Wellcome Collection works to engage underrepresented audiences, including d/Deaf, disabled, neurodivergent, and racially minoritised communities.

Wellcome Collection is part of Wellcome, which supports science to solve the urgent health challenges facing everyone. We support discovery research into life, health and wellbeing, and we’re taking on three worldwide health challenges: mental health, infectious disease, and climate and health.

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