A daring and innovative museum that looks at the social history of a nation whose 'two tales' have intertwined, to produce the fascinating artefacts on display.
Canberra may be the political capital of the modern Australian nation, but Uluru (Ayer's Rock) is considered its spiritual heart – especially by the first Australians. And as a museum celebrating all of the Australian peoples' many stories, the National Museum of Australia has built a connection to Uluru into its very fabric. The Uluru line is a curving sculptural ribbon that starts at the National Museum's entrance, is tangled up inside the building, then streams past the adjacent Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. After that, the line leaps (unseen) towards Uluru itself, some 2575 kilometres away.
It's a neat way of representing how Australia's history is a knotted connection between old and new, and between 50,000 years of Aborigine, and two centuries of European, settlement. And that's also how this innovative museum, only completed in 2001, presents its exhibitions – using single iconic objects to tell the many parts of a tangled tale. So you'll find the oldest simplest technology in Australia – a piece of ochre used to paint Aboriginal stories 50 millenniums ago – next to one of its more modern – the Holden motor car prototype.
The building itself is laid out along the Acton Peninsular, which juts out into Lake Burley Griffin, Canberra's central lake. Both inside and out, it is an explosion of shapes, colours, textures and ideas, making it seem more like a playground than a traditional museum. Inside you'll find the latest interactive technologies to guide and reveal diverse aspects of Australia – such as Ned Kelly, Tasmanian bark canoes, the gold mining booms, Aboriginal tools, or the extinct Tasmanian tiger.
The museum also hosts a long and ever-changing list of temporary exhibitions, and has won awards for its innovative approach to getting stories across to visitors. This could be through the latest touch-and-play apps, or it might be through guides, acting out as characters from Australia's history. Expect the unexpected when you come to the National Museum of Australia – and you'll still probably be surprised.
