Museum News - Statistical Data Included

Art in America, March, 2001 by Stephanie Cash, David Ebony

The National Museum of Australia in Canberra debuts on March 11. Designed by architects Aston Raggatt McDougall and Robert Peck von Hartel Trethwan, the $95-million project consists of a sprawling multi-building complex encompassing over 300,000 square feet. The museum is situated on the Acton Peninsula, alongside the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. Museum director Dawn Casey is expecting some 1 million visitors per year to view permanent exhibitions of art, artifacts, multimedia and interactive installations covering themes such as "The First Australians," "Australia Since 1788" and "Symbols of Australia." More than 10,000 square feet of space is reserved for temporary exhibitions. The inaugural show, "Gold and Civilization," focuses on the discovery of gold in mid-19th-century Australia.

The Meadows Museum, at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, opens its new $20-million facility on Mar. 25. The two-story, 66,000-square-foot structure was designed in red-brick collegiate Georgian style by architects Hammond Beeby Rupert Ainge. Temporary displays will occupy the second floor along with a permanent installation of items from the museum's renowned collection of Spanish masters, including works by Velasquez, El Greco, Goya, Picasso and Miro. The inaugural exhibition, "Poetics of Movement: The Architecture of Santiago Calatrava," organized by curator Alexander Tzonis, is a career survey of the Spanish architect's work [see p. 41 "U.S. Welcomes Calatrava"]. Calatrava recently received the Algur H. Meadows Award for Excellence in the Arts from the Meadows School of Art.

Two museums in Colombia, the National Museum in Bogota, and the Museo de Antioquia in Medellin, have been given a hefty donation of art and cash, the total valued at some $250 million, by Colombian-born artist Fernando Botero. The National Museum will get 61 pieces from Botero's collection of works by artists such as Monet, Renoir, Matisse, Picasso, Dali and Miro. The Medellin museum is set to receive 79 works by Botero, including paintings, drawings and sculptures. The artist has also donated $1.5 million to the latter institution to help refurbish its sculpture garden, an adjacent park and a number of buildings that surround the museum.

The Smithsonian American Art Museum [previously Smithsonian National Museum of American Art] in Washington, D.C., recently received a $10-million grant from the Henry Luce Foundation. The funds will be used to establish the Luce Foundation Center for American Art. Housed in the museum's main building, the center will showcase some 5,000 items from the permanent collection of over 38,000 art works and artifacts.

The Norton Museum of Art in Palm Beach, Fla., has garnered a $3-million gift from businessman Gerald Tsai and his wife Nancy Raeburn Tsai, an interior designer. The funds will be applied toward the construction of a new wing and the new focal point of the museum, to be called the Nancy and Gerald Tsai Atrium. The Tsais also donated two bronzes by Archipenko.

Four art institutions recently won Emily Hall Tremaine Exhibition Awards given by the Tremaine Foundation, based in Meriden, Conn. New York's P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center receives $50,000 toward "The Mae West Show," to be presented at the Clocktower Gallery in Manhattan this spring. The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond gets $100,000 to mount a video installation show, "Outer and Inner Space: A Video Exhibition in Three Parts," later this fall. Earmarked for the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston is $100,000 for "Art and Healing: Ritual and Transformation," to appear in spring 2002. The Baltimore Museum of Art receives $100,000 to support "Exchange Rate," a 2003 show that will consider notions of value in art.

The Ukrainian Museum in New York has received a $3.5-million grant to begin construction of a new building located on East 6th Street in Manhattan's East Village. Founded in 1976, the institution is dedicated to researching and preserving the art and culture of the Ukraine. The 17,000-square-foot structure, designed by New York architects SawickiTarella will include an auditorium and educational facilities, as well as galleries for temporary shows and for the display of selections from the museum's permanent collection of over 40,000 art works and artifacts.