Auckland War Memorial Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira[lower-alpha 1] | Former name | |
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Established | 25 October 1852 (1852-10-25) |
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Type | Encyclopaedic (or 'universal') |
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Key holdings | |
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Collection size | 4.5 million objects[7] |
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Visitors | 859,779 (FY 2016–17)[8] |
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Director | Dr. David Gaimster |
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Chairperson | Dr. William Randall |
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Public transit access | Parnell railway station |
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Nearest parking | On-site and in Domain |
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Panorama in rectiliear projection, showing, at left, the Court of Honour and Cenotaph | | |
Type | |
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Architectural style | Neoclassical |
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Location | Auckland Domain, Parnell, Auckland 1010, New Zealand |
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Coordinates | 36°51′37.1″S 174°46′40.1″E |
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Construction started | August 25, 1925 (1925-08-25) |
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Completed | August 1929 (1929-08) |
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Inaugurated | - November 28, 1929 (1929-11-28)
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Renovated | Expanded 1960; restored 1994–99; refurbished 2000; "Grand Atrium" and 'dome' added 2006. |
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Cost | £250,000 (equivalent to about £19,200,000 in 2023) |
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Renovation cost | - NZ$43 million (1990s)
- NZ$64.5 million (2000s expansion)
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Floor count | - 3 main floors
- 7 floors at Grand Atrium end
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Architecture firm | Grierson, Aimer and Draffin |
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Structural engineer | Holmes Consulting (renovation) |
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Services engineer | Connell Mott MacDonald (renovation) |
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Civil engineer | Holmes Consulting (renovation) |
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Other designers | Salmon Reed Architects (renovation) |
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Quantity surveyor | Rider Hunt (renovation) |
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Main contractor | Hawkins (renovation) |
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Awards and prizes | NZIA Gold Medal in 1929 |
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Architect(s) | Noel Lane |
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Renovating firm | Noel Lane Architects |
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Awards and prizes | - Supreme Award of the New Zealand Property Council
- ACENZ Innovate NZ Gold Award (Structural Engineering) (expansion)
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Designated | 27 June 1985 |
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Reference no. | 94 |
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The Auckland War Memorial Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira (or simply Auckland Museum) is one of New Zealand's most important museums and war memorials. Its collections concentrate on New Zealand history (and especially Māori culture and the history of the Auckland Region); natural history, and the military history of New Zealand.
The present museum building, which is considered one of the most iconic in Auckland, was constructed in the 1920s in the neo-classicist style, and sits on a grassed plinth (the remains of a dormant volcano) in the Auckland Domain, a large public park close to the Auckland CBD.
Early history
Auckland Museum traces its lineage back to 1852, when it was established in a farm-worker's cottage on Princes Street in central Auckland, where the University of Auckland is now located. The need for better display conditions and extra space necessitated a move from the Princes Street site, and eventually the project for a purpose-built museum was merged with the idea of creating a memorial to commemorate soldiers lost in the First World War. The site was a hill in the Government Domain overlooking the Waitematā Harbour. The foundation stone was laid by Prime Minister Gordon Coates on August 25, 1925.[9] Construction was completed by 1929, and the Museum's new building was opened on November 28 by the Governor-General, General Sir Charles Fergusson.[9] Of particular interest is the interior plasterwork which incorporates Māori details in an amalgamation of Neo-Grec and art deco styles.[10] Likewise the exterior bas-reliefs, carved by Richard Gross (1882 – 1964), depicting 20th-century armed forces and personnel, are in a style which mixes Neo-Grec with art deco.[11] The architectural historian Peter Shaw has said that "despite its almost pedantic Classicism, the museum is a fervently nationalistic building".[10] The bulk of the building's walls are "faced" with English Portland stone, with detailing in a tonalite from the Coromandel Peninsula.[10] The quotation over the front porch—which begins "THE WHOLE EARTH IS THE SEPULCHRE OF FAMOUS MEN"—is attributed to the Greek statesman Pericles; its appearance is in keeping with the Museum's status as a war memorial.[12]
Railway Access
Parnell railway station, which features the historic station building of the Newmarket station, was opened on 12 March 2017 in the suburb of Parnell, directly to the east of the Museum.[13] It was thought that the station would see high demand from museum visitors, especially students and school children.[14]
Collections, exhibitions and research
Auckland Museum's collections are organised into three principal areas: documentary heritage (manuscripts, correspondence and other historical documents in archives, along with pictorial art); the major branches of the natural sciences; and human history.[15] The Museum maintains regional cooperation and complementary collecting with other organisations across Auckland (among them Auckland Libraries and Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki).[16][17]
Documentary Heritage
The Museum's Documentary Heritage collections comprise manuscripts, ephemera, maps, charts and plans, newspapers and periodicals, rare and contemporary books and pamphlets, photographs, and works of art in the form of paintings, bookplates, and sketches and drawings. Among the areas of focus are Māori and Pacific cultures,[18] the human and natural history of the Greater Auckland region, New Zealanders' involvement in global conflicts, and exploration and discovery.[19] The Museum holds the only known extant copy of A Korao no New Zealand, the first book written in the Māori language, published at Sydney in 1815 by the missionary Thomas Kendall.[20]
Pictorial
The Museum has holdings in historic paintings, watercolours, photographs and other artworks.[21] The Pictorial collection numbers in the millions,[22] and contains some of the earliest examples of the development of the photographic arts and technology in New Zealand, including calotypes by William Fox Talbot; some of the first known daguerrotypes made in New Zealand,[23] and an ambrotype portrait of the Ngā Puhi chief Tāmati Wāka Nene attributed to John Nicol Crombie.[24]
The latter part of the 20th century is represented by the collection of the documentary photographer Robin Morrison, while among the women photographers of note represented are Una Garlick and Margaret Matilda White. Other collections include the documentary photographs of the Auckland Star and New Zealand Herald newspapers; some work by Arthur Ninnis Breckon and George Bourne, including images made for the Auckland Weekly News;[25] the work of Tudor Washington Collins and John Watt Beattie,[26] and the archive of Sparrow Industrial Pictures. The Museum also has a bookplate collection, which contains more than 7,000 plates collected by Australian scholar Percy Neville Barnett.[27]
Manuscripts and archives
The Manuscripts and Archives collection is one of the largest non-governmental archives in New Zealand.[28] The collection covers large organisational and business archives and smaller personal collections which record and illustrate New Zealanders' lives within the country and abroad, especially during military service.[28]
Among the personal papers held at the Museum are 19th-century papers relating to the Williams family[29] and the Reverend Vicesimus Lush; the papers of the politician John Logan Campbell,[30] the mountaineer, explorer and philanthropist Edmund Hillary;[31] and those of the British Resident James Busby. In addition, the Library also holds the papers of:
The Library is the repository of the Presbyterian Church records for Auckland and Northland.[28]
Maps and plans
The Museum's map collection contains large sequences of official New Zealand maps, WWII-era military maps, subdivision plans,[33] and other material, including atlases, which helps record and provide evidence of early New Zealand development.[34] There is also a small collection of maps relating to the discovery and exploration of the Pacific Ocean and islands by Europeans, dating from before 1800.[35]
Museum Library Te Pātaka Mātāpuna
The Library's collection of books and other publications are focused on New Zealand subject areas and were developed chiefly to support curatorial work and collecting. The collection also features significant holdings of Māori-language materials.
Natural sciences
The Museum's natural sciences collections provide information on the distribution and morphology of plant, animal and mineral species in New Zealand and the regional Pacific. The Museum stores and exhibits 1.5 million natural history specimens from the fields of botany, entomology, geology, land vertebrates and marine biology.[36]
Botany
The botanical collections of the Auckland Museum Herbarium (code "AK")[37] were first established in 1870,[38][39] and are the means by which the department carries out its function of "collection and preservation of botanical materials; education (through public enquiries, individual and group visits, outreach programmes, and the display of material) and research and publication on various aspects of New Zealand flora".[37] The focus of the herbarium collection is on wild plants (native and naturalised) in all plant groups principally from northern New Zealand and its offshore islands.[40] Auckland Museum's is one of only three major herbaria in New Zealand; the others are at Landcare Research Auckland and the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, in Wellington.[40]: 10
Entomology
The Entomology collection contains about 250,000 catalogued specimens and collections ranging from Three Kings Islands to the sub-Antarctic Islands. It is part of a national and international network and aims to contain a comprehensive reference collection of all insect types as well as other terrestrial and freshwater invertebrates (worms, spiders, millipedes and centipedes, some isopods and amphipods) from the New Zealand region. This includes both native and introduced species. Its importance lies in the ability to support research into the biodiversity of New Zealand's terrestrial invertebrates (particularly beetles, moths and parasitic wasps), and their contribution to complex ecologies. Foreign collections of beetles and butterflies feature also, for comparative and educational value.
In 2009, the Museum acquired a collection of butterflies and books about butterflies bequeathed by the late Ray Shannon, a private collector whose interest in lepidopterology began while he was stationed in the Solomon Islands during the Second World War.[41] The Shannon collection comprises "about 13,000 specimens of just under 3,000 species and subspecies".[41]
Geology
The Geology collection was originally focused on material from the Waihi, Thames and Coromandel gold fields, through collecting by the Museum's geologists as well as those donated by private collectors.[40]: 14
Paleontology
The Paleontology collection was established in the early 1900s. The collection contains more than 20,000 specimen lots.[40]: 14
Land vertebrates
The Land Vertebrates collection comprises more than 12,500 bird specimens, 2,500 amphibians and reptiles, and 1,000 land mammals, primarily collected from Northern New Zealand.
Marine biology
The Marine collection, especially its shell assemblage, was largely established through A. W. B. Powell's association with the Museum (1916 – 1987).
Human History
Applied Arts
Established in 1966, the Museum's Applied Arts and Design collection includes ceramics, jewellery, furniture, glass, metalwork, costumes, textiles, costume accessories, musical instruments, horological objects and objets d′art from around the world.[42] The collection numbers nearly 7,000 objects[43] and represents key makers, manufacturers, designs, designers and technical developments and styles primarily of Auckland, but also of the Auckland region of New Zealand, and Western and Eastern cultures. A collection of 7,000 objects from across Asia is displayed on rotation.[44]
Castle Collection of musical instruments
A collection of more than 480 musical instruments includes "workable examples of every member of the violin family, as well as didgeridoos, a zuffolo, harpsichords, a crwth, harps, tablas, a sáhn, horns, trumpets, clarinets, [and] a hurdy-gurdy".[45]
Taonga Māori (Ethnology)
The museum houses a large collection of Māori and Pacific Island artefacts, including Hotunui,[46] a large whare rūnanga (carved meeting house) built in 1878 at Thames, and Te Toki-a-Tapiri,[47] a Māori war canoe from 1830 carved by Te Waaka Perohuka.[48] Within New Zealand, the Taonga Māori collection is of equal significance to that of the national museum, Te Papa Tongarewa. It is a cultural and research resource of the first order, having the most comprehensive range of types and periods of material and is essential for the whole spectrum of studies in Māori art and material culture.[49] The collection dates from the early decades of the founding of the Museum.
Social and War History
The War History collection was established in 1920,[40]: 16 and includes a significant medal collection, a wide range of swords and firearms as well as material culture related to New Zealanders' military service.[40]: 17
War Memorial function
The Museum has an extensive permanent exhibition, "Scars on the Heart," covering wars—including the New Zealand Wars and New Zealand's participation in overseas conflicts such as the First and Second World Wars; the Anglo-Boer War; conflicts such as the Korean and Vietnam Wars, and the country's role in UN Peacekeeping missions.[50] This exhibition is linked to the War Memorial, and shows, for example, models of Māori pā (fortified settlements) and original Spitfire[51] and Mitsubishi Zero[52] aeroplanes. In November 2016, Pou Maumahara,[lower-alpha 4] a memorial enquiry centre, was established,[54][55] and in 2017, the Museum opened "Pou Kanohi: New Zealand At War", a new permanent exhibition designed "to tell young people about the country's experiences of WWI".[56]
Parts of the museum, as well as the Cenotaph and its surrounding consecrated grounds (Court of Honour) in front of the Museum, also serve as a war memorial, mainly to those who lost their lives in the First and Second World Wars. There are two "Halls of Memory" within the museum, whose walls, together with a number of additional marble slabs, list the names of all known New Zealand soldiers from the Auckland Region killed in major conflicts during the 20th century.[12][57][58]
Governance
The Museum is governed by a trust board,[59] and has an Executive Management Team headed by a Director.[60] The board's duties, functions and powers, and its responsibilities to ten statutory objectives are set out in the Auckland War Memorial Museum Act 1996.[61] Paramount amongst its responsibilities is "the trusteeship and guardianship of the Museum and its extensive collections of treasures and scientific materials".[62]
Taumata-ā-Iwi
The Act also tasks the the Board with the appointment of a 5-person Māori Committee known as the Taumata-ā-Iwi.[61]: § 16 (1) The Taumata-ā-Iwi "is founded upon the principle of mana whenua (customary authority of and over ancestral land), and comprises [members or representatives of the] Ngāti Whātua, Ngāti Pāoa and Tainui [iwi]".[59]
The committee is "responsible for the provision of advice and assistance to the Trust Board in a series of matters as set out in the Act,"[59] including matters provided for in the Treaty of Waitangi.[61]: § 16 (8) The Act further "empowers the Taumata-ā-Iwi to give advice on all matters of Māori protocol within the Museum and between the Museum and Māori people at large",[63]: Principle I codified in the committee's governance principles as "the right to advise".[63][64][65]
Directors
The following is a list of Directors to date[update],[66] the first three of whom used the title "Curator":
Name |
Term |
John Alexander Smith (Honorary Curator and Secretary) |
1852 – 1857 |
Thomas Kirk (Secretary) |
1874 – 1923 |
Sir Gilbert Archey KBE |
1924 – 1964 |
E. Grahamm Turbott QSO |
1964 – 1979 |
G. Stuart Park |
1979 – 1993 |
Dr. Rodney Wilson CNZM |
1994 – 2007 |
Dr. Vanda Vitali |
2007 – 2010 |
Sir Don McKinnon ONZ GCVO |
2010 – 2011 |
Rear Admiral Roy Clare CBE |
2011 – 2016 |
Dr. David Gaimster |
2017 – present[update] |
Controversies
Hillary estate
The papers and memorabilia of the late Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man to reach the summit of Mt. Everest, are held in the Museum. In 2009, legal action over publishing rights to his papers between his children, Peter and Sarah Hillary, and the museum.[67] Prime Minister John Key offered to mediate, and his offer was accepted and the matter resolved amicably.[68][69]
Vitali tenure
The appointment and activities of Dr. Vanda Vitali, a Canadian citizen who served as Director from 2009 until her resignation in 2010, saw a number of highly disputed changes in the museum, with numerous staff being made redundant, or having to reapply for their positions. The museum also charged a controversial "donation" for entry (while still claiming to provide free entry), despite a museum levy being part of the regional rates.[70]
Vitali was roundly criticised for many of her actions by a number of former staff and public figures, such as editorialist Pat Booth, who accused her of downplaying the "War Memorial" element of the museum name and function,[70] as well as by former finance head of the museum, Jon Cowan, who in a letter to the New Zealand Herald argued after her resignation that she was responsible for a significant fall in visitor numbers and visitor satisfaction during her tenure. He also claimed that these statistics had ceased to be published in the second year of Vitali's work at the museum, given the clear negative trends of her initial year.[71]
Notes
According to the Museum's website, "Tāmaki Paenga Hira means Auckland's memorial to fallen chiefs and their gathered taonga. Tāmaki is Auckland, the net of Maki. Paenga is to ceremonially layout, heap together on a marae, a margin, a chiefly boundary, and a reference to those fallen in battle. Hira is numerous, abundant, important, of consequence, great".[1]
This name was given by former Museum director Dr. Gilbert Archey, and means "filled with treasures".[1]
This name was given in 1992 by the Māori Language Commission Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori;[1] its meaning was explained by Sir Hugh Kāwharu in a 2001 lecture, "Land and Identity In Tāmaki: a Ngāti Whātua Perspective": I feel I should explain at this point that Te Papa Whakahiku is not a literal translation of "Auckland War Memorial Museum". Te Papa refers to Papatuanuku, the earth mother, the place where all people will be ultimately buried (in this context, in war cemeteries here or abroad). Whakahiku means to bring together treasures, a repository, a museum. Hiku also means the tail of a fish. That is, in the North Island (Maui's legendary fish – Te Ika a Maui) the head is regarded as at Wellington while the tail is at Auckland and all lands to the north: hence "Te Papa Whakahiku".[2]
References
Furey, Louise (2 October 2015). "Tairua trolling lure". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
Stevens, Andrea (17 November 2015). "A living memorial". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 30 January 2018.
Dix, Kelly (26 March 2016). "Photographs of a prophet". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
"Manuscripts". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
Lilly, Hugh; Passau, Victoria (5 August 2016). "Barry Brickell". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018. Auckland Museum holds papers relating to Brickell's studio, his artistic practice and his commissioned works, both public and private. The collection, which dates from 1965 to 1985, includes correspondence, newspaper clippings, sketches and photographs.
Collections & Research: Overview & Direction (marketing booklet), Auckland War Memorial Museum, 2017.
Clarke, Philip. "Encounter". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
"Scars on the Heart". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
"Spitfire". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
"Zero". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
"World War One Hall of Memories". www.aucklandmuseum.com. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018. The top floor of the Museum is dedicated to the memory of fallen soldiers and included within the war memorial galleries is the spectacular World War One Hall of Memories.
"Taumata-ā-Iwi Kaupapa". www.aucklandmuseum.com (in Māori). Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
Cowan, John (25 March 2010). "Reader's Forum". Museum statistics – letter to the editor in The New Zealand Herald. pp. A10.
External links
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