Titanic Exhibit Opens in Chicago
By JONATHAN LIPMAN Associated Press Writer
Thursday February 17 4:14 PM ET
CHICAGO (AP) - Suspended above the center of a dark room is a large, tarnished brass bell that clanged three times on a night to remember 88 years ago.
It's the first thing visitors see upon entering the world's largest display of original artifacts from the RMS Titanic.
``Titanic: The Exhibition' opens Friday at the Museum of Science and Industry. Although the museum expects the exhibit will attract hundreds of thousands of visitors by the time it closes Sept. 4, critics say the show may cross the line between history and Hollywood entertainment.
The exhibit features about 200 relics recovered from the floor of the North Atlantic, including furniture, unbroken ceramic plates, bottles of wine still corked and a section of the hull collected by RMS Titanic Inc (OTC BB:SOST.OB - news)., the for-profit company with exclusive rights to salvage the Titanic's wreck.
``We believe the best way to tell the story historically, educationally, and powerfully, is through the display of real objects, real things,' said Joe Shacter, the museum's director of exhibits.
Taking up 25,000 square feet, the exhibit designed by SFX Entertainment has re-created rooms of the ship that present a timeline leading up to the sinking on the night of April 14-15, 1912.
One room has an 18-foot model of the ship surrounded by blueprints and photos, while another features the ornate bedroom of a first-class cabin, lined with rich burgundy wallpaper and heavy polished furniture. Also on display is the re-created grand staircase similar to the one featured in the 1997 movie.
Visitors first see the lookout's bell that clanged three times warning that the ship was approaching an iceberg.
The bell is meant to set a solemn tone up front, Shacter said, ``letting people know this exhibit is a memorial' not just to Titanic but to the more than 1,500 people who died after it sank.
RMS Titanic Inc. has displayed artifacts from the Titanic at convention centers and museums around the world. The Chicago exhibit is the largest ever.
Other museums, including the Smithsonian Institution, have rejected the exhibit. The International Council for Maritime Museums, which represents hundreds of museums around there world, refuses to accept artifacts recovered from commercial salvage companies to prevent the plundering of archaeological sites. It also objects to the Hollywood-style presentation.
``There's all this confusion about entertainment and serious scholarship,' said Peter Neill, the council's president. ``There may be serious scholarship associated with this Titanic exhibit, ... but the interrelationship with a for-profit entertainment company will confuse the issue.'
Shacter, who sought to bring an exhibit to Chicago after seeing a smaller display in Memphis, Tenn., in 1997, said the Titanic story has a unique place in a museum dedicated to displays of technology.
``It goes to show that all the technology in the world cannot make up for the frailty of human judgment,' Shacter said. |
