There are several museums in Melbourne. It feels luxurious to visit on my time table rather than being a tourist, only having a couple of days or hours, and having to choose only 1 or 2 museums to visit.
Melbourne Museum
We visited the Melbourne Museum with a family who had 2 small children causing me to go into mom-mode. I think the museum was nice but the kids only wanted to visit the dinosaur and spider exhibits. I need to visit by myself so I can visit the rest of the exhibits. It was more like a natural history museum.
Abbotsford Convent
Abbotsford Convent is Australia’s largest multi-arts precinct. I learned about an exhibit on TikTok called Flesh After Fifty that sounded intriguing. From its site:
Flesh after Fifty will explore and challenge negative stereotypes of aging while celebrating and promoting positive images of older women through art.
We made a day of this, walking the 4.2k on a Saturday through funky neighborhoods, eating the worst interpretation of a burrito ever, and skirted next to the Yarra River.
The exhibit was a celebration of women over fifty in photos, stories, sculptures, video, and live performance. There was a room filled with decorative mirrors hanging in different angles throughout. I don’t know what the intent of the room was, but I interpreted it as “if you are over fifty, and looking at this mirror, you are the art, and look how lovely you are.” Pure projection.
Another exhibit was photos and accompanying stories to the photos. One photo was a “women over 90 club” and the women wanted to be role models for women in their 80’s. Inspirational.
National Gallery of Victoria
I was thoroughly impressed by the National Gallery of Victoria. There were traditional exhibits of e.g. Asian art and 17c furniture, but in many of these traditional exhibits, there would be a modern work integrated into the room. Although it was a bit jarring, I think it added to the experience.
There were many large scale audio/visual installations that pushed what I’ve come to know museums to encompass. Forward-thinking expressions that caused me excitement in the re-imagining of art.
I decided to bypass any exhibit that didn’t interest me so I could spend 14 minutes on any one exhibit if I wanted. Giving myself that permission was freeing and I enjoyed this museum immensely.
Science Works
Science Works was similar to any science museum I’d ever visited. I liked the robot installation and the Planetarium show.
Immigration Museum
The Immigration Museum was provocative in its exploration of identity, becoming, and stereotypes. Although it did the historical view of immigration i.e. laws, reasons, practice, the topics delved into more social psychological constructs that I found fascinating. Sexuality and gender were as much of a valid topics as was country of origin or reasons for immigration.
There were a few exhibits that acknowledged that they were being updated to refer to native Australians as First People rather than Aboriginals. I didn’t have as much time here so I will return on another day.
