Museum is an institution where cultural objects/collections are kept and exhibited or showcased to visitors for education, research, entertainment and prosperity purposes. Mounting of exhibitions in the museums is one of the crucial ways of communication in the museums. Therefore, exhibition of cultural objects in museums is the communication between the museum and the public. In a nutshell, the art of mounting exhibition in museums is the direct way of communicating the ideas or information entailed in the cultural objects to the public/visitors with or without tour guide.

In doing exhibitions, so many techniques are involved. The mounting of exhibitions takes many days, months or years to put together. Before we discuss the techniques involved in mounting exhibitions in museums, it is imperative to explain the terms museum and exhibition briefly.

In this paper, the writers adopted the International Council of Museum (lCOM) 2006/2007) definition of museum as a no-profit-making institution in the service of society and development, open to the public, which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits, for the purpose of study, education and enjoyment, material evidence of the people and their environment. From the foregoing, the word exhibit or exhibition was mentioned by the authorities of museums, which tells us how relevant exhibition is to the museum institution.

Exhibition can be defined as “a form of interpretation”; of a complete presentation not only objects but their contexts, meaning, relevant histories, etc. The major significant role played by exhibition in museums is to communicate ideas or facts by means of educating the public. In a related manner, exhibition is to show, to display and to make visible the cultural objects and heritage in the museum institutions. Therefore, exhibition is the centre-nexus of museum profession.

Techniques of Mounting Exhibition in Museums
Like any other museum in Nigeria and all over the world, the methods of mounting exhibitions in National Museum, Benin City are virtually the same. Before setting up an exhibition, a committee will be formed or set up. The committee will be saddled with the responsibility of drafting a story line or format that will guide the exhibitors or exhibition team. It is the format that will give all the necessary information and the sequence the exhibition will follow. The format contains the type, theme and objects you are going to exhibit. As an exhibition officer, when you are given a template/format, you are expected to study it carefully and thoroughly not as a novel but as a building plan that will guide the builder on how to build a house. The template given will determine the type of exhibition to be carried out, be it temporary, permanent, special or children exhibition, and so on.

Next is to know the space provided for the exhibition and the cultural objects you are going to exhibit. Having done this, you can send your budget proposal to the exhibition committee or the curator of the station for approval.

Exhibition Design
This is very important in mounting exhibition in museums. A poor design leads to a poor exhibition which leads to low patronage. You must prepare a floor plan of the available space of the exhibition and all the showcase platforms that will be plotted on the floor plan in order to direct you during the display of the cultural objects. In planning a floor, we should always have it in view that we are exhibiting cultural objects because of the audience. Therefore, the audience should influence both the design and the floor plan. Good floor plan leads to good exhibition. The team of the exhibition must collaborate to produce a very good and reliable plan.

Another important issue we must put in consideration when mounting an exhibition in the museum is lighting system. Most exhibitions suffer from lighting usually because lighting is an afterthought rather than an integral part of the design. The greatest enemy of control lighting is daylight, not because it varies in intensity or brightness but also because it varies in colour.

For a successful exhibition of any type, mock exhibition must be carried out. This will enable the exhibition officer(s) to ascertain if the objects are too few or not. If they are too much, you will advise the committee on what to do for a successful exhibition. The exhibition officer(s) should ensure that during mounting, objects of the same family are exhibited together. Have in it in mind that you are mounting exhibition for the public where all members of the audience are not equally lettered or educated; hence objects should be showcased in such a way that without reading the label attached, one can understand what the objects are talking about.

Another technique of mounting exhibition in the museum is placing of introductory panel. An introductory panel is made and placed at the entrance of the exhibition room so that when the visitors enter, they know what the exhibition is talking about. The write-up about the objects should be in simple and clear language for easy comprehension.

Materials for Mounting of Exhibition
Some basic materials used in mounting exhibition in National Museum, Benin City, as well other museums all over the world are listed below.

1. Showcase is used to exhibit fragile and small objects. There are different types of showcases: (a) Wall showcase, (b) Table showcase, and (c) Two-way showcase.

2. Platform is used to exhibit bulky objects.

3. Mount: This is used to support the base of the objects.

4. Props: They are used to uplift the base of the showcase and platform.

5. Panels: Panels are used to exhibit floor objects or plaques.

6. Mannequin: This is used to exhibit costumes and other clothing materials.

Conclusion
This paper explores various methods or techniques of mounting exhibitions in the National Museum, Benin City, in particular, and museums in general.