Sporting chance

If anyone is unsure about the impact of London 2012 on museums and galleries, they just need to look at what is happening in the UK this year that is related to China to appreciate the Olympic effect.

The 2008 games are being held more than 5,000 miles away in Beijing, but all around the UK, there are exhibitions, talks, artistic commissions, festivals and other events with a Chinese theme.

The Olympics factor is perhaps best summed up by Brighton and Hove Museums' Chinese Whispers: Chinoiserie in Britain 1650 to 1930 exhibition. It is one of the organisation's biggest shows for 20 years and features loans from more than 50 institutions including the Royal Collection, British Museum, National Gallery, Amgueddfa Cymru (National Museum Wales), and National Museums Scotland.

Brighton and Hove Museums is also using Chinese Whispers to introduce a new policy of charging for one major temporary show a year to raise extra funds. The exhibition is taking place at Brighton Museum and the Royal Pavilion, which was completed in 1822 and is an important example of the late chinoiserie style.

"It is something that the keeper of fine art, David Beevers, has been wanting to do for more than 10 years, but it was the Beijing Olympics that made it possible," says Nicola Coleby, the keeper of exhibitions at Brighton and Hove. "We felt that the Olympics in China would give us the chance to apply for significant funding."

Brighton and Hove Museums should hear this month whether its £139,500 bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund for the Royal Pavilion has been successful. This will fund audience development, an events programme and marketing for the exhibition.

Coleby says it has already attracted money from the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, which will finance the publication of a high-quality catalogue. Several individuals have also given financial support, while sponsorship has been secured from local companies.

"China matters"

Finding sponsorship and other financial support will be important for museums hoping to stage exhibitions and events in the run-up to 2012, as there is no large pot of money available for such activities from the Olympics organisers.

There will certainly be opportunities, as the private sector is often keen to support high-profile arts initiatives - a recently published Arts & Business report shows that private investment in the arts was nearly £600m in 2006-07, up 11 per cent on 2005-06.

Indeed, one of the main initiatives to support cultural activities related to China is led by the private sector. China Now is an independently funded, non-profit organisation that aims to build partnerships between the UK and China.

It was conceived by British businesses with interests in China and is led by Stephen Green, the group chairman of global financial services company HSBC Holdings.

"Essentially, the goal is to inform, educate and engage as many people in the UK as possible, and the reason for doing that is simple - China matters, and will increasingly matter," says China Now chief executive Simon Heale.

China Now is acting as a central marketing body that funds a website and PR activity, although it has also raised a small amount of money to help support events.

The organisation launched its activities last month as part of the Chinese New Year celebrations, which included a day of family activities at the British Museum. The events it is promoting cover everything from food and film to art and science.

It remains to be seen how easy it will be to attract money for 2012 activities, but museums working in partnership might help. A major example of this in 2008 is China in Yorkshire, a regional campaign to coordinate and promote activities led by the four Renaissance in the Regions hub museums.

As well as the hubs in Bradford, Leeds, Sheffield and York, a range of other museums and galleries are promoting their events through China in Yorkshire, which has received £351,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund, £80,000 from Arts Council England and £50,000 from Renaissance Yorkshire.

As well as helping to develop and market the exhibitions, including working with local Chinese communities, the money has been spent on training and skills sharing.

China in Yorkshire has already been picked up on by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA) nationally, which described it as a "ground-breaking project" in its Setting the Pace document on planning for 2012.

"I am really proud of it and excited that it is a model for us and others looking towards 2012," says Janet Thompson, the Renaissance Yorkshire hub manager. "Partnership working is something that we are all expected to do, but it is not always easy. But this has come together in a spontaneous way and I think that helped."

The Olympics organisers are also looking at the legacy as an important part of the games, whether this is ensuring that stadiums are used after 2012, or that the work done by museums and galleries is built on.

Activities related to China should have a life beyond 2012, in terms of improvements to display, reinterpretation of collections or contacts with museums in China. The British Museum and Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) announced long-term collaborations with museums across China as far back as 2005.

This has involved curatorial exchanges, skills sharing and joint projects, links that have been strengthened by activities related to this year's Beijing Olympics.

Contemporary currents in China

The British Museum's major exhibition has been the First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army, although it has developed a host of other China-related activities for 2008.

These include the installation of a Chinese landscape in the museum's forecourt, a work by conceptual sculptor Zhan Wang in the Great Court and two displays in the main galleries, one focusing on nature in Chinese art, the other on icons of the cultural revolution.

The V&A's main offering is China Design Now, which opens on 15 March. The exhibition is sponsored by HSBC and looks at new design in China and its context in a period of rapid economic development.

"Design and architecture in contemporary China ranges from traditional craft, to decorative art, to contemporary practice, but we decided to concentrate in the areas of Chinese design that were new and unknown to the UK audience," says Zhang Hongxing, one of the curators of China Design Now and a senior curator in the V&A's Asian department.

"Being a museum with a mission to inform and inspire, we felt that this exhibition ought to tell the UK public what is going on in contemporary China. One of the key messages of the exhibition is that China is changing. The image of the emperor's dragon robe or Mao's suit is out of date."

The mixture of Chinese-related festivals, exhibitions, events and talks that museums are involved in is perhaps a good pointer to the range of activities we will see in 2012. There will also be a tangible link between Beijing and London, as there will be a formal handover of the games from China to the UK in August.

"It would be nice if there was a thread that linked 2008 and 2012, and it would be good to build on any experience gained this year, but there is a different trajectory planned for 2012," says Hedley Swain, programme director for the Cultural Olympiad at the MLA.

"What we need to do in the next couple of months is bottom out what we want our themes to be and make sure they fit with the Olympics organisers."

Legacy planning

It is important that themes decided on are ones that museums can work with in the run-up to 2012. Kevin Fewster, the recently installed director of London's National Maritime Museum, was at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney during the 2000 Olympics.

He says there were four themes developed by the organisers for the Cultural Olympiad and not all of them were appropriate or workable for some museums (Museums Journal February 2008, p36). It is also difficult for museums when there is very little money available to support Olympics-related activities.

"There is no big pot of money that has been set aside, but it would be wrong to say there is no money at all," says Swain. "And there are also opportunities to work with the current Olympics sponsors and to find new ones.

"The bigger museums, particularly the nationals, are very good at finding sponsors, and one of the things we could look at doing is sharing their expertise with smaller museums."

Creating an Olympics legacy by sharing expertise and building capacity is one of the MLA's hopes for 2012. Partnerships such as China in Yorkshire and the work being done at Brighton and Hove Museums now could show what might be possible in four years' time.

www.chinanow.org.uk

www.london2012.com

www.mla.gov.uk/resources/assets//C/China_in_Yorkshire