Museum of Brisbane, The Local

    Client:
    Taloi Havini & Museum of Brisbane
    
    Location:
    Museum of Brisbane, Level 3, Brisbane City Hall, King George Square, Brisbane
  
    Project type: 
    Exhibition Design
  
    Completed:
    2023
  
    Recognition:
    Queensland Chapter of the Australian Institute of Architects - Art & Architecture Award, 2024

As the artist in residence, Taloi Havini invited Speculative Architecture to collaborate on an exhibition display of the Museum of Brisbane’s collection. Two principal ideas formed the basis for the exhibition design:

Reframing how audiences see themselves within the museum, as being part of the Museum’s collection, and contextualising the artworks and artefacts in the collection, to convey the progression from a collection of a municipality’s ephemera to a collection of contemporary art.

An immersive experience was developed that avoided the white cube gallery space and instead presented a spatial experience with familiarity. There is a sense that you are walking within a vitrine, that as a viewer you are part of the City’s collection.

In addition to this, Hugh Hamilton’s drawing “Queensland Pub” of 1886, and Taloi’s own experiences in Australian pubs are drawn upon for the design. A version of a pub, the local, is made that reflects a space of sociability and prejudice (what is allowed in, what is collected).

The collaboration included the concepts for the exhibition, artwork selections, review of texts and development of title, graphic design concept for title and layout of ‘in gallery’ booklet.