100 stories from the Australian National Maritime Museum Now in production, this luxurious book will celebrate both the museum’s 20th-anniversary year and 25 years of the Australian National Maritime Collection. Published in partnership with the University of New South Wales Press, the 250-page, full-colour volume will appear in both hard copy and e-book format and will be distributed nationwide. From our first to our most recent acquisitions, the stories they tell are variously fascinating, curious, poignant or exuberant, but all resonate with a sense of time, place and human interaction.
20 years 20 objects A series of broadcast radio interviews will tell the stories behind 20 of the museum’s fascinating collection items as seen through the eyes of a curator and a conservator. These interviews will appear online as podcasts. Chosen from a collection of over 100,000 items, they will reflect the nature and diversity of the museum and its continuing aspiration of understanding, interpreting and engaging with our rich maritime history and culture.
left: Our 2005–06 exhibition Vikings brought together a unique assemblage of artefacts from northern European museums – and saw staff curator Lindl Lawton transformed into our own version of Brunhilde.
20th Members anniversary lunch
20th anniversary gala dinner
An anniversary lunch on Sunday 27 November will be hosted by museum director Mary-Louise Williams and chairman Peter Dexter, and will feature guest speaker media personality and author Mike Carlton. It offers the good company of fellow Members and a delicious three-course lunch from the museum’s caterer Laissez Faire, accompanied by Coral Sea wines. The annual anniversary lunch is a fine tradition and gastronomic event, and on this anniversary it will be something to remember. For prices and booking details see page 31.
To highlight the museum's need for ongoing community and sponsorship support we're holding a black tie dinner on Tuesday 29th November – the museum's actual 20th anniversary. A couple of special features will include sunset drinks on the new Ben Lexcen Terrace and a special preview of the big summer AQUA exhibition. Corporate tables will be offered as sponsorship packages. Prices are on application. For information contact Neridah WyattSpratt at the museum on 9298 3614.
Foundation Members and Life Members 20th anniversary cocktail party
20 year staff Christmas party
This evening function on Thursday 17 November hosted by the museum director Mary-Louise Williams and chairman Peter Dexter is open to all Foundation and Life Members. (Foundation Members are those who joined within the first year of the museum’s opening on 29 November 1991.) There will be live music, refreshments, recollections of the museums first 20 years and previews of what’s planned for the future. For prices and bookings details see page 31.
A special anniversary Christmas party will be held for present and past staff on Thursday 8 December. above left to right: In the beginning was … a metropolitan working port that was beginning to transform beyond all recognition. Clearing the ground for construction of the Australian National Maritime Museum and the Darling Harbour precinct in 1986. Send us your own museum memories … like this visit to the replica of the Dutch East Indiaman Batavia at our wharves in the Olympic year 2000. We were very young and somewhat green when Paul and Linda McCartney came to visit in 1993. The museum’s shipwrights and vessel managers with our Daring class destroyer Vampire in the drydock at Garden Island in July 2010, on one of the ship’s periodical slippings to ensure that Australia’s largest museum object is in top condition.
Signals 96 September to November 2011
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