The public asked to support MJT following unexpected fire

The Los Angeles–based Museum of Jurassic Technology (MJT) is still reeling from a late-night fire that caused extensive damage to the institution earlier this month. Reported on the night of July 8, the fire completely destroyed the museum’s gift shop and also caused smoke damage to many of the museum’s exhibits. Projected losses during the museum’s closure are expected to reach $75,000. The museum is still scheduled to reopen later next month.

The MJT has held a special place in the culture of Los Angeles since its opening in 1988. Curated by David Hildebrand Wilson and Diana Drake Wilson, the museum’s specialty is inworldly and sometimes disorienting displays, some of which are so bizarre that they are only tangentially true. The museum describes its mission as being “dedicated to the advancement of knowledge and the public appreciation of the Lower Jurassic,” but has very little to do with that era of geologic time. It is, rather, a spiritual successor to wunderkammers, the cabinets of curiosity popular among European aristocrats during the Renaissance.

After first opening in 1988, the museum has gone on to become known for its distinctive, if sometimes opaque, approach to curating history and art. Though some of the museum’s permanent exhibits have been sourced with historical artifacts, other portions play fast and loose with the idea of veracity. Often, this has the effect of confusing patrons, as visitors leave the museum uncertain of the truth of certain displays.

As part of a year-round collection, one of the MJT’s exhibits is a tribute to the late Renaissance polymath Athanasius Kircher, who wrote about a variety of subjects and was a priest in the Jesuit order. Another one of the museum’s permanent displays is a celebration of the ultra-miniature sculptures of the Armenian-American artist Hagop Sandaldjian, who is known for using the eye of a needle as a display case for his artworks, many of which are sculpted from a single human hair.

Other exhibits include a collection of decomposing dice that once belonged to the magician Ricky Jay and “The Garden of Eden on Wheels,” a visual essay on the trailer parks of the Los Angeles area. The museum also contains stereographic radiographs of flowers, microscopic mosaics made from butterfly wing scales, and an eccentric collection of letters sent by amateur astronomers to the Mount Wilson Observatory between the years 1915 and 1935. Since 2005, the MJT has also contained a Russian tea room designed to be a replica of the study of Tsar Nicholas II in the Winter Palace of St. Petersburg.

Reporting on the fire

In a lengthy report written by Lawrence Weschler, a writer whose own 1996 book Mr. Wilson’s Cabinet of Wonder details many of the artifacts in the MJT’s collection, the fire is said to have been first noticed by David Wilson himself. Mr. Wilson resides in a house directly behind the museum building, and, upon seeing smoke and flames emanating from the structure, dashed from his home and ran toward the scene with two fire extinguishers. In his recollection of the fire, Wilson referred to the source as a “ferocious column of flame” and said the fire had reached the corner of the wall that fronts the street.

Wilson’s efforts, however, were stymied by the fact that the fire extinguishers he had at the time were insufficient to slow the spread of the fire. Wilson’s daughter and son-in-law, however, had just arrived at the property and, with a larger fire extinguisher, were able to get the fire under control before firefighters arrived at the scene. Wilson was told by first responders that the museum likely would have been lost in its entirety if they had not arrived a minute later.

The damage from the fire was mostly confined to the gift shop, but smoke damage permeated many of the museum’s exhibits. Wilson described the result as being as if someone “evenly poured over all the surfaces—a thin creamy brown liquid—the walls, the vitrines, the ceiling, the carpets, and eyepieces, everything.” Smoke infiltration can be especially challenging for institutions like the MJT, where the value of presentation is of paramount importance to the institution. Staff and volunteers have been engaged in continuous clean-up efforts since the fire, but progress has been slow.

Financially, the museum has also taken a hit. In an email sent to supporters, Weschler stated that he was working to create an “urgency fund” for the museum in order to help make up for lost revenue. “The Museum of Jurassic Technology is one of the most truly sublime institutions in the country,” he wrote in the note. “It is sui generis, not quite science, not quite art, not quite fiction, not quite nonfiction, not quite narrative, not quite discursive, but all of these, and more, at the same time.”

A reopening date has not been announced, though there is some confidence that, as with its approach to art, the museum will find a way to bounce back.