UK's first exhibition on Marie Antoinette coming to V&A
PLUS: More cash to help London Museum meet construction costs
This edition also features: Towner Gallery faces funding cut | Auckland Castle renamed | Vancouver Art Gallery costs skyrocket
Happy Friday.
You can’t have missed all the *discourse* over Oasis getting back together.
Much of the chatter was over dynamic pricing, Ticketmaster and capital C capitalism. While there’s certainly lessons for museums in this, it’s not the angle I’m focussing on here.
Instead what caught my eye was this Times column by James Marriott where he mused on how the surge for Oasis tickets sums up our modern need for experiences, yet “life’s greatest moments cannot be purchased.” It’s not as puritanical as it sounds and is a Very Good Read. I happen to agree with much of it.
The “experience economy” however is very much part of the museum and gallery discourse. For a decade there’s been much hand-wringing over ‘instagrammable’ moments in exhibitions. More recently more fear over how immersive art experiences are eating our lunch, and are an existential threat.
But it reminded me of something I’ve thought for years: museums and galleries ARE in the experience economy! Their USP is to invite people to come and experience being in the presence of ACTUALLY. INCREDIBLE. OBJECTS. Yes there’s a whole digital engagement conversation to have, but crowds are drawn by seeing amazing stuff. I don’t believe they are really all that fussed about subjects or narratives.
Was the Rijksmuseum’s Vermeer show a smash because people wanted an assessment of his artistic practice? Or was it because 28 world famous paintings could be seen in the flesh, in one room, for likely the only time in our lifetimes? Why did 2m people flock to see Dippy — a CAST of a dinosaur — on its UK tour from the Natural History Museum? Was it because it’s blooming great to have it tower over you?
The Last Carravagio at the National Gallery was a one-painting show that became the 10th most visited exhibition in the gallery’s history. Why? Maybe because it had not been seen in the UK for 20 years. And a show I worked on: Stonehenge at the British Museum. One of the best exhibitions ever mounted but I do believe most people came not to learn more about Neolithic life but because we displayed an actual ancient wooden henge — submerged for millennia — alongside the world’s oldest map of the stars.
My advice to exhibition planners: ditch subjects and selfie moments, and think about what are the coolest, rarest, oldest, and not-seen-in-your-country for decades objects — and then work backwards. (I could also write a whole column on the PR value of these too). For a start, it’s a hell of a lot cheaper for people than the spenny examples Marriott (rightly) believes will ultimately disappoint.
People are crying out for experiences, including experiencing objects. As Oasis have proved, just give people a reason to be here now.
— maxwell
I bring you news and opinion from the world of museums, galleries, art and heritage each and every week. You can support this work by making a donation here.
Need To Know
London Museum looks to loans
The London Museum (née Museum of London) has been given an additional £50m to try to meet the ballooning new cost of its move to a new home.
The Mayor of London and the City of London local authority have both committed an additional £25m each to the project to redevelop Smithfield Market into the new museum. It means the City of London’s total contributions are £222 million, and the Mayor of London’s is £95 million. The project’s total cost is £437m, £100m more than forecast meaning the museum is trying to make up that gap.
The museum must now plug that shortfall. It says it has already raised £45m through donations, and is seeking to get £30m more via philanthropy. But in a sign of how they may be hitting the limit of what they can raise through giving, the museum is looking to take out a loan of up to £20m to meet the full budget. Loans of course, need to be paid back, meaning annual operating budgets once open will be hit. (Read more)
Towner faces funding cut
Councillors in Eastbourne are poised to drastically cut the local authority’s grant to the Towner Gallery — host of last year’s Turner Prize — as part of a plan to make “painful savings."
Eastbourne Borough Council says it has "repeatedly warned" that the costs of homelessness are causing an "unprecedented strain" and that it now has no choice to but ask councillors to consider measures that are topped with the gallery’s grant being cut. In 2022/23, the council provided £413,880 to the venue, 18% of its unrestricted income. The council also proposed the immediate closure of the Beachy Head heritage centre. (Read more)
Meanwhile, Birmingham City Council has been forced to defend its world-famous pre-Raphaelite art collection. A new BBC ‘investigation’ forced the council to reveal — via Freedom of Information — the value of Birmingham Museum Trust’s art collection (which it holds on behalf of Birmingham’s residents of course). Worth over £450m, the piece says the council refuses to sell any of it to make up their huge deficit. Writing on Twitter, Birmingham Museum Trustee Sapreena Kumari responded to the story by saying “the artwork belongs to the city and is part of our civic history. Leave it alone.” (Read more)
Seems relevant: my recent interview with Birmingham Museum Trust CEO Sara Wajid revealed one US tour of those artworks raised £470,000 for the Trust. Plus, read to the end to see the results of last week’s poll on whether it’s ever OK to sell-off art collections.
Let them see Marie Antoinette
The very first UK exhibition — and only the third ever outside France — dedicated to the most fashionable queen in history — Marie Antoinette — will open at the V&A next September. It promises to consider her status as a “glamorous villainess” and how she still influences the worlds of fashion, photography and design more than 230 years after her execution. It’ll be sponsored by Manolo Blahnik.
It’s the highlight of the South Kensington museum’s slimmed-down exhibition programme for 2025. There’ll also be a huge show dedicated to the creations of jewellery house Cartier, which will feature more than 350 objects. In June, Design and Disability will look at disability as a culture through its engagement with design, art, architecture, and fashion. Meanwhile, East London’s Young V&A will open an exhibition on how images of ancient Egypt continue to infuse popular culture today.
With just three exhibitions opening, it’s an ever shrinking number of annual shows at the V&A. 2022 saw four exhibitions, including the popular Fashioning Masculinities. In 2019, five shows were announced, including exhibitions on Cars and Christian Dior. (Read more)
News from the UK
Visits 🆙 | Membership numbers for the National Trust have dropped slightly this year, but visitor numbers have jumped 5%. In its annual report, it said that 25.3 million visits were made to its properties. It noted an even larger increase — 12% — in non-member visits. The Trust said this could suggest more people are prioritising paying for special days out over committing to annual subscriptions due to cost-of-living concerns. (Read more)
New name 🏰 | County Durham’s Auckland Castle has been renamed to better reflect its heritage. The 900-year-old building will now be known as Auckland Palace to honour its history as the palatial seat of Prince Bishops of Durham. Auckland Palace is one of the best-preserved Bishop’s palaces in Europe, surrounded by 10-acres of historic gardens. Senior Curator Clare Baron said that “where once this was a palace just for the Prince Bishops, now it’s a palace for the people”. (Read more)
More delays 😢 | A multi-million pound project to transform Leicester’s Jewry Wall Museum is facing yet more delays, as a second contractor working on the scheme went bust. Elmwood Projects, which was commissioned make the displays for the centre, has gone into liquidation. Last year, construction firm NMCN collapsed. The opening date for the £15m project has now been pushed from January to the summer next year. (Read more)
Shakespeare saved 🎉 | A renowned American playwright has gifted the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust its largest private donation in its 177-year history. The Olivier and Tony award-winning Ken Ludwig gave £1m to restore Stratford-upon-Avon’s 400-year-old Hall’s Croft, the home of Shakespeare’s daughter Susanna. Ludwig agreed to pay for the work after being shown the poor state of the building on a tour. He said he hoped to “ensure that it stands for the next 400 [years].” (Read more)
News from around the world
Canada 🇨🇦 | The mega-project to construct a new home for the Vancouver Art Gallery is to be considerably delayed, as it’s revealed costs have skyrocketed. In two years the budget has soared 50%, and is now projected to cost well over C$600m (£337m). Already a decade in the making, the start of construction next month now won’t happen. The Gallery blames the soaring cost of construction, yet the President of the Tate Americas Foundation called that excuse “preposterous.” (Read more)
France 🇫🇷 | French academics have accused of the Musée du quai Branly and the Musée Guimet of bowing to pressure from China after altering their terminology to language preferred by Beijing. One example cited in an open letter published in Le Monde said that "Tibet" has been replaced from the Musée du Quai Branly catalogue in favour of the Chinese name "Xizang Autonomous Region.” The museum claimed it carries out its work with “complete independence.” (Read more)
Italy 🇮🇹 | A lightning strike knocked a huge chunk of stone off Rome’s famous ancient Arch of Constantine. No one was injured and all of the debris was collected. The 4th century structure will now be repaired. The same sudden violent storm — described as a ‘water bomb’ — saw the lower tunnels of the Colosseum and the Trevi Fountain flooded, as a whole month’s average rainfall fell on the city in a single hour. (Read more)
Australia 🇦🇺 | Three men have been charged over a raid at a regional museum which saw them steal 27 antique firearms. The weapons included one from the 1700s and a pistol gifted by the Sultan of Oman. 13 have been recovered in police raids. The volunteers who run the Lithgow Small Arms Factory Museum in New South Wales were devastated by the thefts. Police believe the missing 14 firearms may have been sold to the public. (Read more)
Best of the rest
Majesty’s memorial | The location of the official memorial to the late Queen Elizabeth II has been revealed. A statue or sculpture will be erected in St James's Park in London, meters from Buckingham Palace. (More)
All forgiven | Last week I reported on the Israeli boy who broke an ancient jar in a Haifa museum. Staff kept their promise and invited him back. On his return he learnt about the restoration of the object, and he gifted them his own hand-made jar. (More)
Royal appointment | The Prince of Wales returned to royal duties — with added beard — after his summer break, with a visit to the Saatchi Gallery’s homelessness exhibition. He was delighted to hear visitor numbers were smashing expectations.(More)
Feel old? | Me and my fellow Millennials are officially old: Emo culture has matured to be old enough to be the subject of exhibitions. And there’s a public call out for MySpace photos for display — if you dare revisit them. (More)
Birthday party! | Tate Modern’s Director confirmed in an interview with the Art Newspaper that the gallery will host a “huge festival” on Monday 12 May next year to mark its 25th birthday. Karin Hindsbo says it’ll be “free and open to all.” (More)
👀 Last week’s most clicked news story | V&A completes move of 250,000 objects to new storehouse in East London
📊 Last week’s poll results | Is it ethical for museums to sell objects from their collection to raise money?
⛔️ No. Never ever 47%
🤞Only if it’s the only option 34%
💵 Yes it’s fine, it’s their choice 19%
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