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Scottish Museums feature on Art Fund Prize shortlist

Three Scottish museums feature on this year's longlist of ten projects for the prestigious Arts Fund Prize. The new Riverside Museum in Glasgow; the National Museum of Scotland's re-development; and the refurbishment of the National Portrait Gallery have been put forward for 'The 'Museum of the Year' Prize which aims to reward projects that: 'recognise and stimulate originality and excellence in museums and galleries in the UK, and increase public appreciation and enjoyment of all they have to offer.'         

A single award of £100,000 is presented to a museum or gallery whose entry, in the opinion of the judges, best meets the Prize criteria through a project completed or mainly undertaken in the previous calendar year. 

The ten museums in the running to win the 'Museum of the Year' prize are:

-The National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh: Portrait of the Nation.
The SNPG reopened following a £17.6 million transformation by Page \ Park Architects in December 2011, the first refurbishment in the museum's 120-year history.

Scottish National Portrait Gallery © National Galleries of Scotland, photograph by Chris Watt

-National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh has undergone a £47.4 million redevelopment by Gareth Hoskins Architects, which reinvents the grand Victorian vision of an encyclopedic museum for the contemporary era.

National Museum of Scotland © Andrew Lee

-Riverside Museum, Scotland's Museum of Transport and Travel, Glasgow. The new museum by Zaha Hadid Architects, which opened in June 2011, incorporates Glasgow's well-loved Museum of Transport with new ways of displaying and interpreting the collections.

Riverside Museum, Glasgow © Culture and Sport Glasgow (Museums)

-Bletchley Park, Milton Keynes, Bucks, the historic site of secret British codebreaking activities during WWII and birthplace of the modern computer, which features The Life and Works of Alan Turing.

-The Hepworth Wakefield, West Yorkshire by David Chipperfield, which opened in May 2011 following a £35 million development bringing together Wakefield's art collection.

-The Holburne Museum, Bath, Somerset, which reopened in May 2011 following a £15 million refurbishment.

-M Shed, Bristol: A New Museum for Bristol, devoted to telling the story of the city and its people. The £27 million development opened in June 2011 and has already attracted almost 450,000 visitors.

-Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery, Exeter, Devon. With collections ranging from fine art to archaeology, botany to geology, the museum attracted over 50,000 visitors within its first month of reopening in December 2011.

-Turner Contemporary, Margate, a new art gallery for Kent, which opened in April 2011 following a £17 million development.

-Watts Gallery, Guildford, Surrey: The Watts Gallery Hope Project, devoted to the work of Victorian painter George Frederic Watts (1817–1904) has recently undergone a £10 million refurbishment.

This year's judges are: Chris Smith, Lord Smith of Finsbury (chair of judges) former Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport from 1997 to 200; Jim Al-Khalili, a theoretical physicist, author and broadcaster; Charlotte Higgins, chief arts writer for the Guardian; Dr Lucy Worsley, Chief Curator at Historic Royal Palaces; Sir Mark Jones, art historian and former Director of the Victoria & Albert Museum who also oversaw the creation of the National Museum of Scotland; Rick Mather, an American-born architect who has worked in England since 1963; and Lisa Milroy a Canadian painter working in the UK.

A shortlist of four museums will be announced on 14 May before the 'Museum of the Year' is named at a ceremony at the British Museum on 19 June. To vote for your favourite museum click on the following link

Main image: Scottish National Portrait Gallery © National Galleries of Scotland, photography by John Mckenzie