Helen Andreoni writes on matters which are addressed in the report commissioned by the Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA) by Amareswar Galla (also in this edition of Artlink).
De-accessioning is too often characterised as an ill-wind, blowing through the vast and mostly undisturbed reaches of our cultural store-houses capriciously violating the integrity of our collections.
According the the Australia Council figures in 1990 a number of people exceeding the entire population of Australia visited the 187 Australian Museums that employed paid staff in 1989/90 at a cost, for maintence, development and operations in excess of $13.00 per head of population, excluding any charges imposed on entry to museums or exhibitions. And what does $13.00 buy for the Museum going public?
I am particularly troubled about debates such as those illustrated by the publications 'What Price Heritage? - Finance 1989' and 'What value Heritage? DASETT 1990' and Professor Donald Horne's article 'Weekend Australian Jan 4-5 1992' on museums, because there is nearly always truth on all sides.
The quintessential purpose of Museums is to encourage and instil the joy of intellectual and aesthetic discovery. Abstracted partly from a public lecture entitled 'Ideas -Heresies even - for Museum Futures' given in Perth for the Western Australian Government Department of the Arts Task Force on Museums in August 1991.
Looks at the exhibition 'Terra Australis Incognita' at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery in New Zealand, to celebrate the 350th anniversary of Abel Tasman's discovery.
Guest editor for Vol 12 No 1 Museums on the Edge. This edition was founded on a perception of a lack of any quantity of readily available material on the Australian and New Zealand experience of museums.
On 23 October 2002, yet another Council of Australian Museums Associations (CAMA) ran down. Conferees were already half deep in thought about melting credit cards and distant work site desks stacked high with urgent files. Well Not exactly CAMA...
Book review Australian Art Museums and Public Galleries Directory published by the Art Museums Association of Australia Inc and the National Centre for Australian Studies Monash University 1991.