ART

What’s new at the Smithsonian? How about the complete skeleton of a 70-million-year-old shark, an antique Torah mantle from a California synagogue, the drum set of the late jazzman Buddy Rich, a small bronze sculpture by Rodin, and two live Komodo dragons. These are among the 466,181 items acquired last year by the Smithsonian Institution, where everything old is new again. However, only a tiny percentage of the total of about 134 million objects, artworks and specimens in its collections are on display in the Smithsonian’s museums. The bulk of the items, some 118 million, are scientific specimens housed in the National Museum of Natural History, where they are used extensively in research.