Australia's National Local Government Newspaper Online

Quiet success at the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery

One of the quiet success stories in Tasmanian tourism has been the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery. Administered by Launceston Council, it is the largest museum and gallery in Australia located outside a capital city. It has a surprising range of exhibits on display.

Recently, as part of the Tasmanian Bicentenary, the only known surviving example of a quilt sewn by convict women during transportation from England was on display at the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery at Inveresk earlier this month. The Rajah Quilt, on loan from the National Gallery of Australia was exhibited from September to November 2004.

The gallery enjoys an enviable reputation and national profile for its collections of Australian colonial art, contemporary craft and design, Tasmanian history and natural sciences. Special features include a Chinese temple, planetarium and now, the interpretation of one of Tasmania’s most intact nineteenth century industrial environments, the Launceston Railway Workshops.

The museum is located on two sites, the original purpose built building in Royal Park and the Inveresk site, once the Launceston Railway Workshops.

The development of the workshops is a story of transformation. Stage one was the Tasmanian Conservation Centre, which now provides the State with national standard conservation laboratories and workshops. Stage two saw Tasmanian architectural firm, Artas, team with internationally renowned Australian architect, Andrew Andersons, to develop a new Art Gallery and associated facilities.

One third of the impressive and dominating Stone Building, named after the engineer Edward Stone, is the Art Gallery with the high quality exhibition space. The other two thirds house the Academy of the Arts, a joint venture between the University of Tasmania and TAFE Tasmania.

Stage two also involved the development of buildings that now house a range of exhibitions interpreting the history of the workshops.

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