Association for Heritage Interpretation
2006 Awards
Award
The Life and Works of William Butler Yeats
Leabharlann Náisiúnta na hÉireann / National Library of Ireland
The National Library of Ireland’s new Yeats exhibition is magnificent.
The route, through a variety of means of displaying his life and work – screens showing the text against his own or actors’ voices reading some of his best known poems, artefacts such as the carved lapis lazuli stone that gave rise to the famous late poem, manuscripts, first drafts, letters, cartoons, paintings and photographs, many given or lent by the Yeats family – all amount to a stimulating experience for the visitor. They are also routed in a manner that enables the story and significance of Yeats to unfold clearly.
Especially impressive is the information technology that enables one to scrutinise manuscripts that are behind and under glass more closely via accompanying screens, which one can operate to isolate, focus and enlarge what might otherwise be fairly indecipherable details from the original manuscripts. The public were clearly absorbed and delighted with this technology.
We were particularly pleased to hear from one visitor in a motorised wheel chair that she felt completely enfranchised by the exhibition’s concern for physically disabled visitors.
The exhibition directs you to further sources of information about Yeats and also has an accompanying programme of events. For example, the day the judges visited there were two short Yeats plays being preformed at lunchtime. The Library also offers regular half-hour long tours of the exhibition, picking out highlights, answering questions and explaining how the IT screens can be operated. The staff the judges encountered were very friendly, knowledgeable, clear and enthusiastic.
The whole entry is totally outstanding and an unmissable experience for any visitor to Dublin interested in Irish history and culture.
The route, through a variety of means of displaying his life and work – screens showing the text against his own or actors’ voices reading some of his best known poems, artefacts such as the carved lapis lazuli stone that gave rise to the famous late poem, manuscripts, first drafts, letters, cartoons, paintings and photographs, many given or lent by the Yeats family – all amount to a stimulating experience for the visitor. They are also routed in a manner that enables the story and significance of Yeats to unfold clearly.
Especially impressive is the information technology that enables one to scrutinise manuscripts that are behind and under glass more closely via accompanying screens, which one can operate to isolate, focus and enlarge what might otherwise be fairly indecipherable details from the original manuscripts. The public were clearly absorbed and delighted with this technology.
We were particularly pleased to hear from one visitor in a motorised wheel chair that she felt completely enfranchised by the exhibition’s concern for physically disabled visitors.
The exhibition directs you to further sources of information about Yeats and also has an accompanying programme of events. For example, the day the judges visited there were two short Yeats plays being preformed at lunchtime. The Library also offers regular half-hour long tours of the exhibition, picking out highlights, answering questions and explaining how the IT screens can be operated. The staff the judges encountered were very friendly, knowledgeable, clear and enthusiastic.
The whole entry is totally outstanding and an unmissable experience for any visitor to Dublin interested in Irish history and culture.
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The exhibition brings life to Yeats' inspiration