Culture Talk

The 60 vs 9,000 thing about the Shosoin is actually the interesting part

The GONOM piece has a small note that I think is the real story. The Shosoin holds about 9,000 treasures, but each year only around 60 come out, and this year 11 for the first time ever. That's an incredibly slow rotation.

It made me think about how Western museums work. Big museums also keep most of their collection in storage, but they don't make a ritual of it. In Nara, the imperial seal is lifted every autumn for inspection, and the exhibition is built around that.

I find this model kind of beautiful. Scarcity makes people actually look. But as a journalism student I also wonder: who decides which 60, and is there public access for researchers to the rest? Does anyone know how this works?