Museum in Tenerife set to reopen after being closed for seven years

The Archaeological Museum of Puerto de la Cruz will reopen its doors to its permanent exhibitions later this year, after being closed for seven years since June 2017 due to a damp problem that, even today, remains unresolved, although there is finally a provision of €80,000 to address it after several years.

The facility in question houses one of the most important collections of aboriginal ceramics in the Canary Islands. In June 2017, while 3D reconstruction work was being carried out on 20 pieces to exhibit them in the virtual museum, the staff noticed hidden moisture in the exterior walls.

As it is constructed with stone, mud, and wood, it had seeped through and ended up breaking the base of a display showcase in a store room, which was holding some large storage vessels

Although there was no physical damage to the artefacts, it was found that the damp problem persisted in the other rooms, so a decision was made to remove all the pieces that were in the storage facilities and store them elsewhere in appropriate conservation conditions.

Since then, the exhibition part has been closed to the public, although not the museum, whose collections have been available for visitors to enjoy and has continued with its activities and temporary exhibitions.

When the permanent exhibition reopens, it will incorporate the latest multimedia and audiovisual technology for its presentation, to make them more in line with current times, given that a lot of time has passed since it closed.

For now, work will be done on three of the display showcases, because the new ones required by current regulations make them very expensive, and they are manufactured outside of Spain with special characteristics to control relative humidity and temperature, which should fluctuate below 18 degrees and allow for the housing of inorganic material, such as ceramics. The idea is then to continue next year with the remaining two.

Ceramics are a very important part of Guanche culture because they are present throughout aboriginal life, but also after their death, in the funerary belongings, as they believed in the afterlife and provided their dead with the elements they needed for the long journey they undertook.