Professor Kylie Message, head of the Humanities Research Centre, has written about the National Museum of Australia's new gallery, Great Southern Land.

As visitors enter the new exhibition through a darkened grove of towering Bunya trees, it is clear from the outset the redeveloped gallery has better articulated the 1975 plan’s ambitions for the museum to be “bold and imaginative”.

It also realises the plan’s focus on the Australian environment, Aboriginal history, the history of Europeans in Australia and the intricate relationships between people and the environment.

...In this new gallery, the museum is surer of itself. It communicates an awareness of its own responsibilities as a national museum that has had to reckon for decisions made historically by it and in its name.

It understands the gravity and necessity of its role in reaching out to people, and expects visitors to come prepared to practice intellectual curiosity, self reflection and respectful discussion.
 

Read the full article in The Conversation

Kylie Message has received funding from the Australian Research Council.