This dissertation is based on a poster exhibition of the Portsmouth Block Mills, a steampowered
workshop at Portsmouth Naval Dockyard, designed to produce the wooden
pulley blocks used to manage a sailing ship’s rigging. The exhibition is presented as a
kind of experiment, intended to discover whether academic history can be
communicated to a wide audience in a museum environment. In designing the
exhibition I drew upon a range of academic literature. The key aim is to mediate
between the often complex scholarly work of academic historians and the potential
museums have for attracting, entertaining and educating audiences.
The exhibition portrayed the Block Mills in the wide historical context of war,
industrialisation and workforce control. The central concept of the exhibition was based
on the notion of the Block Mills as a manifestation of the Panopticon principle of
surveillance. The exhibition was mounted in Portsmouth Historic Dockyard in July
2009. An audience survey was used to assess the effectiveness of the display in
conveying the scholarly content. A diary was kept throughout to try to give as accurate
an account as possible of the creative process of production. By analysing the creative
process the dissertation provides a new perspective on exhibition design, thereby
addressing a gap in the museological literature. It will thus be relevant to the wider
museum community.