Museum of Old and New Art

The Museum of Old and New Art ( MONA ) is an art museum that located in the Moorilla wine region on the Berriedale peninsula in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia, is located. It is the largest privately funded museum in Australia. The museum displays antique, modern and contemporary art from the collection of David Walsh. Walsh called the museum once a " subversive Disneyland for adults".

The MONA was officially opened on 21 November 2011, coincidentally the same time during the third MONA FOMA festival. The opening ceremony was attended by 1350 invited guests. 2500 other guests were taken for a visit to the evening event by drawing lots. There were bands like True Live, The Scientists of Modern Music, Wire, Health and The Cruel Sea.

The Dark MOFO is the annual festival of the winter solstice at the Museum of Old and New Art The first festival was held from 13 to 23 June 2013.

Building

The predecessor of MONA, the Moorilla Museum of Antiquities, was founded in 2001 by the Tasmanian millionaire David Walsh. It was closed in 2007 in order to avoid unnecessary renovation costs in the amount of $ 75 million. The new museum was designed by the Melbourne architect Nonda Katsalidis and built by Hansen Yuncken. It is a three-storey building in the cliffs of the Berriedale peninsula. The decision to put the building to a large extent underground, was taken by David Walsh, in order not to affect two historic houses of the artist Roy Ground, located on the property. Walsh said that the new museum presenting the visitor slowly and its presence does not obtrude [ ... ] with a hint of danger that the experience of art to experience again fired.

The building has no windows and gives the visitor an intended ominous atmosphere. Upon entering the museum begegenen visitors a seemingly endless flight of stairs, an experience that a critic once with the descent into the city of Petra compared (city). To see the art, the visitor from the basement must work your way back to the surface, following a trajectory which is to be understood as an alternative to the leading down spiral duct at the Guggenheim Museum.

The museum can be best reached by ferry across the Derwent River.

Exhibitions

The museum houses 400 works of art from David Walsh's private collection. Notable works in the exhibition are works such as Sidney Nolan's Monanismus Snake, which were shown for the first time the Australian public. Including a machine that converts food in faeces. Or even Stephen Shanabrooks " On the road to heaven the highway to hell" and Chris Ofili's The Holy Virgin Mary. The curators of MONA are Nicole Durling, who is responsible for contemporary Australian art and Olivier Varenne for modern international and contemporary art.

Reviews

Architecture

Katsalidis architecture of the museum was regarded not only as successful by fulfilling its function as a presentation space for a collection, but rather extend it a special experience for the visitor and a choreography of light game room design and material selection of a unique and great, idiosyncratic whole arises.

Art

Michael Connor from the conservative literary and cultural magazine Quadrant said, " MONA see art of a depleted, decaying civilization. " They illustrative by lights, impressions and amazing effects, a moral bankruptcy that merge perfectly with contemporary fashion, design, architecture and cinema. This art is expensive and testify of decay.

Richard dormitory hall, art critic for the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph, says that Walsh do not collect famous artists; His indifference, against the Fashion, is one of the strengths of its collection. Walsh may " art that makes fun and excite attention, comparable to the sting of a bee or a blow to the solar plexus ."

Tourism

In October 2012, the author of the Lonely Planet series of guide -placed Hobart at number seven of the top ten cities to visit in 2013. He referred to the MONA as the main attraction of the small town - a situation comparable to Bilbao and the Guggenheim Museum.

Costs

The running costs amount to eight million Australian dollars annually. Worn they are covered by the proceeds of the estate, the brewery, restaurant and a hotel on the same site. In May 2012, it was announced the museum wanted to end its policy of free entry. Since admission for visitors from other states and abroad are collected, while Tasmanians and young people continue to receive free admission.