Hearst Museum opens Beer and Brewing Exhibition and hosts Beer Fair and Symposium October 10, 2009

PRLog (Press Release) - Sep 25, 2009 -
Renowned beer experts and representatives of premier Bay Area breweries will join forces on Oct. 10 for the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology’s third annual symposium and exhibition in a series focused on the anthropology of food.
“99 Bottles of Beer: Global Brewing Traditions 2500.B.C – Present” runs from 12pm to 6pm at the Hearst Museum (103 Kroeber Hall, Berkeley, CA, 94720 @ the corner of College and Bancroft)  and begins with an outdoor beer fair featuring tastings from 21st Amendment Brewery, Anchor Steam Brewing , Hoppy Brewing Co., Eel River Brewing Co., Butte Creek Brewing Co. among other beer makers.  Expert food pairings will be provided by Henry's Publick House and Grill of Berkeley. For visitors interested in hands-on brewing, a workshop on how packaging effects flavor will be led by 21st Amendment.
At the symposium, from 3pm to 5pm, Fritz Maytag, president and brew master of Anchor Steam Brewing, will share his experience of leading the revival of micro-brewing in the Bay Area.  He will be joined by Charles Bamforth, the Anheuser-Busch Endowed Professor of Malting and Brewing Sciences at UC Davis.

"For a myriad of reasons, beer has achieved a status often perceived as inferior to that of wine,” says Bamforth. “Thoroughly unjustified! My presentation will highlight how beer is vastly more complex, much harder to make, considerably more interesting and better for your health." Other speakers will include Christine Hastorf, a UC Berkeley professor of anthropology, who will discuss the archeology of beer, and Bruce Paton, executive chef of the Cathedral Hotel in San Francisco, who will offer his expertise on the best pairing of food and beer.

The beer fair accompanies the museum’s newest exhibition, also named “99 Bottles of Beer: Global Brewing Traditions 2500.B.C – Present.” Curated by Ira Jacknis, a research anthropologist at the museum, the exhibition presents 130 beer-related objects from many eras and broad geography. This rich display reveals the striking unities and diversities of human cultures as they come together to celebrate the fruit of the grain.

“The exhibition marks the first time this unusual collection has been on public display,” says Jacknis. “It goes well beyond beer as we know it today.  The diversity of objects is incredible, on one end of the scale we have traditional German steins and American beer bottles and on the other, we have artifacts used by ancient civilizations, such as a stunning four-foot-high Incan jar for corn beer and Egyptian beer cups that are more than 4,000 years old.”
Tickets for the Fair start at $20. For the early bird special, to purchase tickets and for complete program information please go to: http://hearstmuseum.berkeley.edu/beer.
NOTE: For all media enquiries please contact Penny Betts at (510) 642-3683 or pennybetts@berkeley.edu.