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# Sum of the Arts
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/sum-of-the-arts-33/
- Published: 2015-11-20T12:00:13.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:42:51.000Z
- Description: Number of magnetic tape recordings in museums and other archives that won't be possible to digitize in 20 years due to changing technology and disintegration = 46,000,000
- Author: Allison Meier
- Tags: Art, Sum of the Arts, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 07:13 (2014, 2015, part 3)

![Dante Gabriel Rossetti's illustrated poem eulogizing the death of his pet wombat (November 6, 1869): "I never reared a young Wombat To glad me with his pin-hole eye, But when he most was sweet & fat And tail-less; he was sure to die!" (via British Museum)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2015/11/dantedeathwombat.jpg)

Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s illustrated poem eulogizing the death of his pet wombat (November 6, 1869): “I never reared a young Wombat / To glad me with his pin-hole eye, / But when he most was sweet & fat / And tail-less; he was sure to die!” (via British Museum)

[*Sum of the Arts*](http://hyperallergic.com/tag/sum-of-the-arts/) *is a periodic tabulation of numbers floating around the art world and beyond.*

- Age at which Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s [beloved pet wombat died](http://mentalfloss.com/article/71164/how-wombat-became-famous-art-muse?ref=hyperallergic.com) (the 19th-century painter eulogized him in an illustrated poem, above) = **2**
- Number of cities where you can find [the colorful “mineral” Fordite](http://www.dailydetroit.com/2015/11/17/did-you-know-detroit-has-its-own-rare-gem/?ref=hyperallergic.com), made from layers of built-up automobile paint = **1** (Detroit)
- Number of false ceilings [discovered in the renovation](http://www.citylab.com/design/2015/11/how-americas-oldest-art-museum-building-got-a-high-tech-makeover/414642/?ref=hyperallergic.com) of the Renwick Gallery in Washington, DC = **3**
- Metric tons of blue whale bones that are being [dusted and relocated from a gallery to the main entrance hall](http://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/examining-blue-whale-move-begins.html?ref=hyperallergic.com) of the Natural History Museum in London = **4.5**
- Number of wire gymnasts [held aloft by one metal man](http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/nov/15/alexander-calder-performing-sculpture-review-merry-master-perpetual-motion?ref=hyperallergic.com) in Alexander Calder’s “The Brass Family” (1929), on view at the Tate Modern = **6**
- Number of newly identified Francis Bacon paintings [to be unveiled](http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/nov/16/new-francis-bacon-catalogue-to-reveal-more-than-100-unseen-works?ref=hyperallergic.com) in his complete catalogue raisonné = **100**
- Number of childhood drawings by Lucian Freud going to London’s [National Portrait Gallery](http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/nov/16/lucian-freud-archive-national-portrait-gallery-inheritance-tax?ref=hyperallergic.com) as part of an archive being donated instead of an inheritance tax = **162**
- Number of adjectives [recognized by a computer](http://www.studio360.org/story/designing-computer-great-taste/?ref=hyperallergic.com) designed by Brigham Young University scientists to understand art = **2,000**
- Square meters of empty *Second Life* land bought on eBay by artists Franziska Lamprecht and Hajoe Moderegger [for a digital dump where players could abandon items](https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28505-what-digital-trash-dumped-in-games-tells-us-about-the-players/?ref=hyperallergic.com) \= **4,096**
- Number of magnetic tape recordings in museums and other archives [that won’t be possible to digitize in 20 years](http://nautil.us/blog/how-chemistry-is-rescuing-our-audio-history-from-melting?ref=hyperallergic.com) due to changing technology and disintegration = **46,000,000**