The announcement in May of the
redevelopment of the WA Museum is good news, but has been a long term in
coming. It had a false start along the way in 2008, when under Dawn Casey's directorship the
Museum's relocation to the old Swan River powerstation was announced. Although the monies were about the same for the latter project, about half was
going to be eaten up by site remediation. And it seems to be generally agreed in
Perth that the
powerstation was not a good site being off the tourist track and difficult to
access.
So the new plan sounds a whole lot
better way to spend the not inconsiderable sum of $428.3 million.
What the good
citizens of WA will get for their money is 23,000 m2 of museum, including
various refurbished heritage buildings with 8,500 m2 of public spaces, themed
around Being Western Australian, Discovering Western Australia and Exploring Our
World, and 1,000m2 of temporary exhibition space.
As Australian museum projects go it
dwarfs anything we have seen of late, which admittedly has tended to be new
wings ($50m at MCA in 2012, $45m at the Australian Museum in in 2008), is almost 4 times the cost of GOMA (2006) in Brisbane, is twice the cost of
the National Museum (2001) and
significantly more than the Melbourne Museum (1998). The challenge will be for the director,
Alec Coles, to hold onto the funds over various budget cycles. There is no doubt
that Coles is a smart political operator and much of the credit for getting this
over the line is due to him, but Bill Bleathman, the able director of the
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, saw the promise of a similar sum
whittled away to a paltry $30m for their current
redevelopment.
From the largesse of WA’s booming
mining driven economy to the other end of the spectrum, and it's interesting to
see what happens to museums in an economy that is really being hit hard, namely
the UK . The raw facts are that 42% of
UK Museums Association member institutions have cut staff in the past
year according to their most recent survey, and a quarter have had to close all
or part of their sites. Bear in mind that this is what happened in 2011, after
at least 2 years prior to that of a similar picture. But the good news is that
out of adversity in true British fashion there are good things evolving (and
it's not just the lift to the spirits that the Olympics is bringing). The
survey is peppered with comments such as " Challenge does foster
resourcefulness", 'There is a more pragmatic approach to service delivery", '
the sector will emerge more radical and responsive to the social needs of the
public', and 'being more entrepreneurial has to be good for museums and
galleries in the long term'. Add to this increasing visitor numbers, and 36% of
members saying the quality of their services will increase over the coming year
( up from 13% the previous) and it all sounds positively
rosy. To top it all, UK public support for the return of the Elgin marbles to Greece is on the decline, because there is real
concern that Greece 's dire financial state would
mean they will be unable to properly care for them. Not sure that view is going
to hold water in the long term, but for now it will keep the British Museum’s 6
million annual visitors (and rising) happy.
Julian Bickersteth
Managing Director
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