SFT Tour - Day 9 - Orange Museum

It was cold this morning and it didn't improve much, reaching only 12C by mid afternoon. Not an outside day.

As a result, it was a slow start, coffee in town and then off to the Orange Museum and then the Art Gallery. Seemed like a reasonable day.

Before we got started, our neighbour required help with a battery problem with his camper. Boiled down to releasing his battery from its mount so he could investigate its problem. I just happened to be carrying the tools he needed.

Coffee was in a small cafe, Nimrods, with seating for man-bun types and music we'd never heard before. In such circumstances, I usually run. Did I mention it was cold outside? In the end, the service was outstanding, the invitation from the other patrons was generous and genuine and the coffee was superb. Sue had a cake with dates in it (sorry ... best I can muster) and we managed to find her a seat on a lounge with about 47 throw cushions behind her to support her back. I was sitting on a three-legged stool that was about 30 cms off the ground and looked like it was stretched cow hide on a under developed conga drum.

But seriously ... the coffee was superb.

The Orange Museum is part of a complex which opens up onto a courtyard. Very modern. Lots of high concret walls and glass. The other buildings in the complex are the Art Gallery, the Library, a cafe and the Tourist Information Centre. 

The museum is one big space, divided by a large wall and with various display tables and cabinets dotted about. The mark of a good museum is the quality of the antiquities, the accuracy of the information, the variety of presentation and the strength of the curation. Too many local museums we have entered suffer badly from failings of these four points, particularly the last. Too much on display will overwhelm and discourage you from engaging. This museum gets it oh so right on all counts.

One large chamber opens out to a current display for children on the pollinators of the Orange district and engages them through a simple yet very effective activity and then follows up by allowing their input into the knowledge base of all. Very clever. 

The displays were very informative and because there wasn't mountains of information to absorb and because it was presented in a variety of ways, they were extremely effective. Actual footage of daily life in Orange in 1927 was showing on a monitor. The original film was recovered from a box, on a shelf, of a shop that was about to be demolished in 1994. No one knew anything about it but it was footage showing activities in the butcher shop, the bakery and the fire station, as well as other daily activities in the business district of Orange.

There was even a video loop presenting a welcome to country from a local elder which wasn't just words but sincerity.

It was all really well done.

Off to the cafe for lunch. Nothing I could eat and even if I could, I couldn't afford it. $19 for a sandwich is beyond my means so the difference in our check in time (13:12) and check out time (13:17), was short.

Oh well, who cares. There was always the Orange Regional Art Gallery to see ... ah no. Closed temporarily until October 2021. A different definition of temporary than I usually use but currently undergoing a development which will add 270 square metres of contemporary gallery space, a 75 seat theatre and new, state of the art storage. Existing display spaces will be updated. Worth wating for. A community which places priority over its art spaces is a good community.

Click to see today's photos

Home for a late-ish lunch, reading and a bit of forward planning of the time we have left in this trip and the warmth of the van. We didn't move from that spot again. The neighbour bought us chocolates for the small assistance I gave him this morning and we consumed them with the rest of a Robert Stein Merlot.