The Asian Civilisations Museum is not the only place one can find the Belitung Shipwreck on display. You can also see them at the Goodwood Park Hotel!
Tang treasures at hotel
Straits Times, 09 February 2012 (subscription required)
The museum is not the only place where you can view Tang-era treasures from the controversial Belitung shipwreck.
A little-known fact is that 88 artefacts from an Arab dhow wrecked off Belitung Island in Indonesia have been on display at Goodwood Park Hotel’s Tang Treasures Suite since 2007.
This might come as a surprise to those more familiar with a storm that blew up over the treasure trove recently.
About 400 of these ninth-century treasures from the vast collection of 50,000 ceramic jars, bowls and vases of Chinese origin, plus a few gold and silver objects were displayed at the ArtScience Museum in Marina Bay Sands last year. The exhibition was titled Shipwrecked: Tang Treasures And Monsoon Winds.
Jointly organised by the Asian Civilisations Museum, the National Heritage Board, the Singapore Tourism Board and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian Institute in the United States, the show was meant to travel to the Smithsonian. But it found itself in troubled waters in a dispute over how the objects were recovered from the wreck.
Some of the pieces, including 130 gold, metal and ceramics, can now be seen at the Asian Civilisations Museum at its show, The Tang Shipwreck: Gold And Ceramics From Ninth-Century China.
The items at Goodwood Park Hotel are on loan from the Singapore Tourism Board and displayed with the aim of sharing a part of history with hotel guests and visitors. The display is located next to L’Espresso cafe on the ground floor.
Full story here (but hidden behind a paywall). I might pop by one of these days to take a look!
