Shifty laws and slippery slopes

This week is perhaps the biggest push from the curatorial side of things, although the exhibitions team have a couple of hectic weeks ahead, building, installing and testing the exhibition.

While finishing labels, checking text and meeting journalists, I note that this time last year I was up to my knees in snow, walking in the Pyrenees. If you slip down an icy slope, then its time to grab your ice axe from your pack and try and bring your descent to a halt. Or indeed anything to hand: walking pole, shovel, snow shoes…

I mention this because, according to the news, the Icelandic PM Geir Haarde has criticised the UK's use of anti-terrorist legislation to freeze the local assets of some troubled Icelandic banks. Presumably this was not what the framers of this legal implement had in mind.

But such repurposing of legislation is nothing new. The controversial 'stop and search' ('sus') laws that were reformed in the 1980s derived from an 1824 Vagrancy Act, something that Taking Liberties’ interactive element will explore. Current campaigners also worry about how existing legislation can be targeted at peaceful protests, while some complain that the Human Rights Act has unwitting consequences.

More happily perhaps, Magna Carta and Habeas Corpus have been revisited and re-used over time to defend certain rights – again something that the exhibition will explore.

We've also been doing a certain amount of recycling ourselves, comparing labels from old exhibitions, spending time on JSTOR and among the Library's own book stacks, reworking other people's thoughts and facts into bespoke and brand-new labels.