A Little Bit of Everything

Some objects are made of merely one material, but the majority are made up of several materials. It is the job of experts to identify these correctly and document them in a database. For better searchability, an organized system of terms is used in the database. This system of terms is called a "thesaurus", the ancient Greek word for "treasure house", which is also the origin of the word "safe". Related expressions are arranged together in such a "word-treasure vault". A well thought-out division into several levels is also very helpful, similar to an identification book for plants.

For this exhibition, all terms that can be found in the Weltmuseum Wien database are sorted alphabetically. Then, for each material term, an object is selected as an example for the exhibition. This creates a walk-in materials science lexicon.