“From nativity figures to baroque paintings – we deal with everything”: On the department of Overall Inventory and First Inventorisation in the department of Central Documentation

The collection of a museum is never static and complete, but always continues to grow. The Deutsches Historisches Museum (DHM), for example, administers a broad spectrum of collections consisting of many different materials from past and present, which is reflected in the great variety of the objects. The DHM takes as many as 7,000 new objects into the collection every year. All these new objects are registered centrally in the collection’s database by the department of Overall Inventory and First Inventorisation so that the new objects are listed among the assets of the DHM Foundation. For these activities, registrars Nina Bätzing and Liane Marr de Arenas use their wide range of experience to deal with the many different historical exponents: from bride’s shoes to nativity figures, from paper bags to baroque paintings. In this article we take the occasion of the transfer of responsibility from our longstanding staff member Liane Marr de Arenas to Nina Bätzing to take a closer look at the multifaceted spectrum of tasks and duties of the department “First Inventorisation and Overall Inventory”