• The city’s global majority collections comprise more than 9,000 objects

• Research will lead to an exhibition at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery

• Community members’ shared knowledge will influence how collection is interpreted and displayed.  

Local community members are being invited to take part in a series of engagement events hosted by Birmingham Museums and Legacy West Midlands which will contribute to a new exhibition of the city’s African collection.

Birmingham’s global majority collections comprise more than 9,000 objects originating from Africa, Oceania, Asia and the Americas.

Most of this ethnographic material originates from the private collections of individuals who had some personal connection with Birmingham or the wider Midlands. It includes items acquired by colonial officer Percy Amaury Talbot, Birmingham-born businessman Arthur Wilkins and missionary Ida Wench.  

Current research being undertaken into the African collection will lead to the curation of an exhibition at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery later this year.  

To support this work, local community members are being asked to find out more about the objects in the collection and share their knowledge with the research team, which will influence how the collection is interpreted and displayed.  

Ian Sergeant, senior curator (global majority collections) at Birmingham Museums Trust, said:

“At present, we know so much more about collectors like Percy Amaury Talbot, who was a British colonial officer in southern Nigeria between 1902 and 1931, than we do about the people who made the objects in the collection, or where they were made.  

“By engaging communities and possibly people with lived knowledge and experience of these objects, we want to  give voice to these objects and their history.”

The first session will take place on Tuesday 10 February from 12 noon to 2.00 pm at Soho House (currently closed to the public for general visits due to ongoing maintenance issues).  

The event is free to attend and refreshments will be provided.