Dippy, dollar & David Attenborough
Plus: £850m given to UK museums
Hello!
Can you believe the clocks go back tomorrow? Like, where did the summer actually go? At least we all get to enjoy an extra hour in bed.
If you missed it in your inbox earlier this week, don’t forget to check out my interview with Hypha Studios, a new charity that is using art to save the high-street. They’ve just moved eight artists into a shopping centre in Bristol. It’s a fascinating project. Read the interview here.
There’s lots of news this week, so let’s get on. And keep reading to the end to see a mind-bending Art Fund tube ad that went viral this week.
Maxwell
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This week’s top story
£850 million. That’s how much extra cash the Chancellor Rishi Sunak dished out to the cultural sector in his Budget and Spending Review this week. Financial Times
£300m will go to maintain the estates of England’s national museums, and 110 regional museums will share £75m for their building upkeep and developing their digital facilities. £125m will go to the Natural History Museum for its new research centre in Oxfordshire. The least sexy announcement - but perhaps the most important for the sector as a whole - was tax reliefs for exhibitions which have been doubled and extended for two years.
The Chancellor’s giveaway was widely welcomed. The Museums Association (MA) said there were “some notable wins for the sector.” Maria Balshaw, director of the Tate said she was grateful for the “much-needed investment in the public museum buildings which make up such a vital part of our cultural infrastructure”. Chair of the British Museum George Osborne said it was great to see “a doubling of the tax credits we introduced.” The tax breaks were “excellent news” according to the Director of Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums Keith Merrin.
Covid dealt a massive blow to museums in the UK, and it will still take years for them to recover. But the Budget has provided a major boost, especially to national museums, who as the MA make clear “have been hit particularly hard by the loss of international visitors.” The recovery will still be long, but it is now that little bit easier.
This week’s other news
In other Budget news, £2m was awarded to plan for a new Beatles attraction on Liverpool waterfront. Or was it? The city council were quick to make clear that the new venture had actually been in secret planning for a number of years, that it would be “much more than the Beatles” - it could include a school and rehearsal space for the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. There then followed a press release saying that the attraction would be called the Pool and it bizarrely didn’t mention the Beatles once. So the council had to clarify that actually it would be “Beatles-led” but also “would be about a lot more.” So that’s all nice and clear then. Oh and there was even some public pass-agg squabbling between the metro mayor and the council over who was actually in charge of it all. Something tells me the next few years of this project will definitely be a long and winding road. Liverpool Echo
Dippy the Diplodocus is coming back to the Natural History Museum (NHM) after a three-year tour of the UK that saw him visited by over two million people. The 26m-long replica of a skeleton began traveling the country in 2018. Visitor records were broken in some form or another at every venue, including 250,000 visitors at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery that made it their most successful temporary exhibition ever. Dippy will return to the NHM for a (temporary) display next summer. I asked the Museum what the plans were beyond next year’s display but they were tight-lipped. I wouldn’t be surprised if a permanent home outside London was being considered. Londonist
The Museum of Brexit marches on. It’s been confirmed either Peterborough or Boston, Lincolnshire will be the home of the venue that will tell the story of Britain’s EU exit. Both places returned strong Leave votes in the 2016 referendum. The Museum also received a boost via a six-figure donation at a fundraising dinner last week. The Telegraph
A group of 30 climate activists occupied the Science Museum overnight this week, in protest against energy companies with links to fossil fuels sponsoring the Museum’s activities. This includes a new gallery being supported by Adani Green Energy. But the Science Museum Group’s Chair, Dame Mary Archer, hit back in the Telegraph by rejecting the “dismissive” accusation of greenwashing. She said “the polarising approach of activists… gets us nowhere.” Metro
All aboard! The RSS Sir David Attenborough - formerly known as Boaty McBoatFace - has docked in Greenwich in South East London for a three-day festival being held by Royal Museums Greenwich. Ice Worlds, which begins today at the National Maritime Museum, comprises 15 interactive and immersive exhibition stands showcasing environmental science. The ship’s first ever trip to the capital also coincides with the upcoming UK Presidency of COP26. Sir David Attenborough stepped aboard too, to call on world leaders to listen to the science on climate change. Mail Online
President Emmanuel Macron of France this week began the formal transfer of 26 objects to Benin in the first large-scale act of restitution to Africa by a former European colonial power. The pieces are on display in Paris for the last time until Sunday, at the Quai Branly Museum. “The purpose of this adventure is not for France to get rid of every piece of the heritage of others. That would be a terrible vision,” Mr. Macron said at the ceremony at the Museum on Wednesday. New York Times
Louvre Abu Dhabi has announced three new major exhibitions that will coincide with the UAE’s 50th anniversary celebrations. From next month, 59 new loans (many of them from France) and 56 new acquisitions will be unveiled, while in 2022 there’ll be a show on the story of Versailles. The Museum’s famous dome will also be transformed into a visual installation to mark the country’s golden jubilee. The National
The countdown to the 2022 World Cup in Qatar is on, and this week the FIFA World Football Museum announced it will host a global exhibition ahead of the tournament with all 211 member associations showcasing objects representing the football culture of their respective countries. It will be the world’s first joint global exhibition about the beautiful game. Museum Next
and finally
A tube advert from Art Fund promoting their National Art Pass went viral on Twitter this week, for all the wrong reasons. Can you make sense of of it?
This newsletter is three years old! If you’ve been enjoying it, please consider buying me a digital coffee via the link below. Each digital coffee is a donation which helps keep it free.