Welcome

Kim McKay AO Director & CEO

The power of community

From our award-winning exhibitions to our world-leading science, community is at the heart of everything we do at the Australian Museum.

A great example of community engagement is the recent scientific expedition to Norfolk Island, conducted by the AM in collaboration with the local Norfolk Island community, Parks Australia, the Australian Institute of Botanical Science and Auckland War Memorial Museum. The expedition has already helped confirm evidence of Polynesian settlement on Norfolk Island during the 13th and 14th CE, with even more new discoveries expected to come from the biological diversity surveys conducted by AMRI scientists.

In this issue of Explore, you’ll also read about the leadership role the AM has taken working with other cultural institutions to coordinate disaster response and assist the Lismore Art Gallery and the Richmond Rivers Historical Society after the devastating floods experienced earlier this year.

And we’re excited to have opened another new gallery for the local community to enjoy – Minerals, with more than 1800 dazzling specimens on display from our extraordinary collections. We have also produced a Minerals catalogue, Mineral Icons, which is a spectacular reference guide to the best of our collection. (AM Shop, $49.99.)

The AM is proud to be a civic space for Sydney and New South Wales and we love engaging with our ever-growing community of AM Members, as well as communities from across Australia and around the world.

I’d like to take this opportunity to welcome our new AM Members – we now have more than 40,000! We’re looking forward to sharing more great exhibitions with you in the future, with the international touring exhibition Ramses the Great and the Gold of the Pharaohs set to open in November 2023.

Your membership helps keep our doors open, advances our critical research, conserves our collection of 22 million objects and specimens and provides opportunities for community and educational engagement – thank you for your support.

I look forward to seeing you at the AM soon.