From fine art to bottles of poison and a dentist drill
THERE are lots of reasons to visit Touchstones Rochdale this spring.
Replacing Rachel Kneebone’s exhibition in Gallery 2, 3 and 4, from March 2 until June 1, will be Harry Meadley: But What If We Tried?
Intrigued by the fact visitors often ask why Touchstones don’t show more of the over 1,500 works in the borough’s fine art collection, artist Harry Meadley set the challenge of attempting to display as much of the collection as possible in a single exhibition.
Spanning three galleries, But What If We Tried? presents the result of this attempt.
As much about the process as the exhibition, the final display will also include a multi-part documentary filmed by Harry Meadley featuring the Touchstones staff as they endeavour to realise this impossible task.
But What If We Tried? promises to be a unique and unmissable opportunity to see a large proportion of the collection on public display and discover more about all the conservation and research work that goes on behind the scenes.
From January to July, to coincide with this exhibition, there will also be a display, at the Middleton Arena, of a selection of rarely seen works from the fine art collection.
Continuing until April 13 in the Heritage Gallery is From Herbs to Hospitals: Health and Wellbeing in Rochdale.
This very popular exhibition provides a great opportunity to learn more about the development of health and well-being in Victorian Rochdale through to the advent of the NHS in the 1940s.
From Herbs to Hospitals shows how medicine and healthcare went from being a luxury for those who could afford it to a service available for everybody.
It features a range of objects that have never previously been displayed and have been donated to the museum collection from various donors including Birch Hill Hospital and Rochdale Infirmary.
Highlights include a beautiful wooden home medicine chest, a selection of poison bottles, a nurse’s uniform, a selection of medical instruments and a horrifying dental drill alongside many loaned objects from the Museum of Medicine and Health.
Working in partnership with Manchester University to celebrate the NHS turning 70, the exhibition also tells the stories of local people and their experiences of the NHS through a series of oral history recordings.
The show also includes a display created by people living with dementia who attend the Alzheimer’s Cafés borough. Society Memory within the