After visiting the British Museum’s emergency money exhibition, which I was really looking forward to seeing, I’m left with a feeling of slight disappointment, it has to be said. It could have been so much more informative with scarce and rare pieces on display – if only they had of asked! I remember that they had a set of 4 political notes from Emden, (Lm.323 & Gr/Mehl-336.1) that was missing a piece….so only 3 of the set were on display……..some pieces that were displayed were with an incorrect town of issue………and the spread of notes and number of notes on display was also very limited. I know the exhibition was not fundamentally for passionate collectors but I think a great opportunity was missed here by the British Museum.
I had a chap email me who had visited the exhibition himself and who had come all the way from France. He was expecting to see rare pieces that one doesn’t often see. He left feeling disappointed of course. It was in the British Museum so they really should have done much better in my view, as they should be the absolute experts and professionals in the field. Generally though, it was good that they at least tried to bring the notgeld phenomenon to life with a display like this and hopefully make more people aware of notgeld and the story behind them. They had a couple of interesting exhibits but as I have said, in my view, this was a…………… ‘missed opportunity’ ………..and they could do much better next time……….
I did speak to the secretary of the ‘Department of Coins and Medals’ within the room where the exhibition was (on the day of my visit) and left her with a free copy of 1 of my ‘German Gems’ notgeld books, asking her to get someone to please contact me, as I wanted to help them or anyone that was studying the notgeld phenomenom. I also emailed the department on my return home and also tried to get in touch with the gentleman doing the gallery talks and also his senior at the University……………..but to date, have had no reply………from anyone. So I am thinking on the whole……………………’not great’. Sorry British Museum but some honest feedback. It’s still the case – I haven’t heard anything from them and it is now the end of May. Nevermind – one tries to help but sometimes that help is not wanted it seems.