How British museums are documenting the pandemic

AT THE END of March, the prime minister sent a letter to every household in Britain. Printed on headed paper and signed by Boris Johnson, 30m of them went out, telling Britons “you must stay at home”. One of them is now in the collection of London’s Science Museum in South Kensington. Tilly Blyth, the museum’s principal curator, explains that her job is about “making sure we bring a personal experience to the science”. At the other end of central London, in Euston, Mel Grant of the Wellcome Collection, which focuses on health and medicine, says the letter is something “we wouldn’t actively go out and take”. The difference in approach between two museums whose subjects are at the heart of the crisis raises a question that institutions across the country are grappling with: How do you document history that you are living through?