Retracing the Footsteps: Analysis of the Skušek Collection

Tina Berdajs

doi:10.4312/as.2021.9.3.141-166

Authors

Tina BERDAJS University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Arts, Slovenia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4312/as.2021.9.3.141-166

Keywords:

Ivan Skušek Jr., Slovene Ethnographic Museum, East Asia, collecting, provenance research

Abstract

The paper presents preliminary research into the original scope of the Skušek Collection, based on four lists and an old museum inventory entry of the collection of Asian art collected by Ivan Skušek Jr. during his six-year stay in China between 1914 and 1920. Furthermore, it presents the cross-referencing of the mentioned documents with the first inventory record when it was formally taken over by the National Museum of Slovenia in an attempt to recreate the original scope of the collection. Through analysis and comparison of these records and with support of photographic sources this research attempts to put objects of the Skušeks’ original collection into four different groups based on provenance research. Through several case studies it gives new insights into the dynamics of the largely unknown parts of history of the collection, and the paths some of the individual objects travelled over several decades in the first half of the 20th century.

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