Ulster Museum beats competition to scoop £100,000 Art Fund Prize
First Northern Irish winner for museum prize
The Ulster Museum has won the 2010 Art Fund Prize, the biggest museums and galleries award in the UK.
Since reopening in October last year after a £30m redevelopment the museum has become Northern Ireland’s busiest tourist attraction, with visitor numbers currently running at more than 355,000.
The other shortlisted museums were Blists Hill Victorian Town, part of the Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust in Shropshire; the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in Coventry; and the Ashmolean in Oxford.
Judges included author AC Grayling, Lars Tharp, the director of the Foundling Museum, Sally Osman, the former director of communications at the BBC, and Steve Jones, the scientist and broadcaster.
The Ulster Museum was involved in a row with the culture secretary Nelson McCausland last month when he wrote to the trustees asking them to include alternative views of creation in the museum’s displays
Creationism row in Belfast, Museums Journal July 2010, p6
Since reopening in October last year after a £30m redevelopment the museum has become Northern Ireland’s busiest tourist attraction, with visitor numbers currently running at more than 355,000.
The other shortlisted museums were Blists Hill Victorian Town, part of the Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust in Shropshire; the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in Coventry; and the Ashmolean in Oxford.
Judges included author AC Grayling, Lars Tharp, the director of the Foundling Museum, Sally Osman, the former director of communications at the BBC, and Steve Jones, the scientist and broadcaster.
The Ulster Museum was involved in a row with the culture secretary Nelson McCausland last month when he wrote to the trustees asking them to include alternative views of creation in the museum’s displays
Links
Creationism row in Belfast, Museums Journal July 2010, p6