New Exhibitions in the National Maritime Museum:
Home Port / Sailing: Games of Exploration / Pirates. Myth & Reality / The Lower Deck Yard / SOS!
The National Maritime Museum declares a State of Emergency, and comes aboard to Save the Sea!
For the first time ever, the museum has taken a stand on critical current issues, especially saving the seas and oceans from ecological disaster.
The new exhibitions and interactive stations are designed to give visitors an understanding of the meaning and importance of the sea for humankind, and encourage a connection to and a concern for the ecological issues involved. The exhibitions are user-friendly: they arouse curiosity and are full of opportunities to play and learn new things.
Home Port
The exhibition Home Port is all about love of the sea. It includes a display of miniature ships in bottles, and model ships from around the world made by seamen as a unique leisure-time hobby on long voyages. A new video installation offers a window on the diverse research currently carried out in Haifa and other Mediterranean locations, in fields such as marine biology and ecology, marine archaeology, practical history, and more. The installation was created with the cooperation of important research institutes and units within Haifa University, among them the Leon H. Charney School of Marine Sciences, the Mediterranean Sea Research Center of Israel, the Leon Recanati Institute for Maritime Studies, the Yaacov (Yak) Kahanov Laboratory for Ancient Ship Research, and the Rilov Lab at the Israel Oceanographic & Limnological Research Institute.
In addition, the digital activities invite visitors to express their opinions about environmental issues that are part of the public discourse: To what extent are we prepared to designate beaches and allocate resources for the establishment of marine nature reserves? What is our position regarding construction along the coastline? How far will we go in reducing our use of disposable items, and our purchase of imported products that are transported in polluting container ships? ...and so on.
Sailing: Games of Exploration
The exhibition, Sailing: Games of Exploration, was designed to offer an experience of the world of ships, much of it through games at various stations. Try your hand at some maritime skills: communicate with code flags and light signals, load container ships, learn the names of parts of a ship, identify different kinds of vessels, and play a large-scale version of the popular “Battleship” game. Within the exhibition are models of ships that took on special, important roles in the story of Israeli independence and the maritime revolution that followed it.
The game-stations were created with the assistance of the Ministry of Jerusalem and Heritage, the Ministry of Culture and Sport, and the Council for Conservation of Heritage Sites in Israel.
Pirates. Myth & Reality
This interactive exhibition for the whole family is dedicated to one of the most fascinating subjects of the sea: the world of pirates. From ancient times until the present day, pirates have gone to sea to plunder other ships and coastal communities. Many of our ideas about the subject come from the books we read and adventure movies we saw as children. But what do we really know about the pirates’ lives? What was their reality, and what is merely a product of fantasy and imagination?
Here you'll find a display of swords, pistols and rifles used by pirates, models of ships, pictures, and dioramas. The exhibition opens a small window into their real lives: figures of famous pirates, male and female; the different kinds of pirates that plied the seas and oceans, some in the service of their countries, others for their own personal gain; the ships and their armaments; the regions in which they operated throughout history, from the China Sea to the Caribbean and the Mediterranean (and even in Haifa!); the food they ate, the punishments they endured, the way of life and rules of behavior on board; how the loot was divided among them – and more.
A particularly fascinating section of the exhibition looks at modern piracy, a contemporary phenomenon in regions where local government is too weak to confront it. The exhibition includes interactive stations of reading, dressing up and games, and the screening of Hollywood movies from the early days of cinema: “Peter Pan” (1924) and “The Black Pirate” (1926).
SOS !
Visitors to this exhibition will be able to discover, investigate, and renew their acquaintance with the wonderful world of the sea – through experiences, games and creativity. Listen to the voices of the whale and the shark; learn how seamen navigated the high seas and how they coped with dangers and fear; get to know the ancient sea-gods and -goddesses and the ocean-sailing super-heroes of our own time – and leave with lots of ideas about preserving the sea and the marine life within it.
The exhibition includes stations for activities, created in collaboration with the Rosh Carmel Marine Community of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel, and “The Mediterranean People,” a nation-wide coalition of local communities campaigning for the establishment of “protected areas” along Israel’s Mediterranean coastline. A partner-project is International Earth Day, whose aims include raising awareness of environmental crises, and encouraging activism through art.
The Lower Deck Yard
The outdoor Yard, with its collection of ancient anchors, has been developed for enjoyable learning games. Discover how boats manage to stay afloat; pump water as they used to do once; hoist and lower a sail like real sailors; roll up your sleeves and row a boat; take charge as the captain at the steering wheel; learn special knots with rope or macramé; make paper boats that float – or just relax at a picnic table in the pleasant courtyard.
The Lower Deck Yard was upgraded with the assistance of the Ministry of Jerusalem and Heritage, the Ministry of Culture and Sport, and the Council for Conservation of Heritage Sites in Israel.
A colorful wall relief, made for the museum by artist Jonathan Gold, is the new gem in the Lower Deck Yard. Using the ‘sgraffito’ plaster technique, the artist evokes the enchantment of the deep sea.
The artwork, which was supported by Mifal Hapayis and the Ministry of Culture and Sport, creates a dialogue with the tradition of wall paintings and street art that have become popular in Israel, and especially in Haifa.