MTG Hawke's Bay: Date set for reopening with special weekend planned

MTG Hawke's Bay will reopen on Saturday, July 24.

We're delighted to confirm that MTG Hawke's Bay will reopen on Saturday, July 24.

We have really missed having the community in and around the museum and can't wait to welcome you back!

Of course, we'll have activities and entertainment to mark the occasion and make it a special weekend. While we won't be open for the whole of the school holidays, we will at least be open for the last weekend so we hope our families will enjoy a taste of the museum again before returning to school.

Sprinkler work is complete and the scaffolding will be coming down any day now. Work on walls and ceilings, which were cut to access the sprinklers, is ongoing and this will be followed by painting and cleaning.

Then the wonderful team of museum staff can start to reinstall the galleries to have the whole place ready for July 24.

Familiar exhibitions will still be in place, such as Waka Korero Māori, 1931 Hawke's Bay Earthquake and Silver: heirlooms from the collection.

Both Billy Apple® A Brand Looking for a Product 1962—2020 and A Bloody Business: the history of five Hawke's Bay freezing works, will be reinstated so they can complete their planned time on display. I've had many queries about these with people worried they had missed out, so I'm pleased to be able to say it's not too late to see them.

There will also be two new exhibitions in place when we reopen. For Home and Country: Women's Institutes in Hawke's Bay celebrates the 100th anniversary of Women's Institutes in New Zealand and the role of Hawke's Bay local, Anna Elizabeth Jerome Spencer (Bessie Spencer), in starting the first institute in Rissington, Hawke's Bay.

The history of the institutes and of Bessie Spencer have been extensively researched by the fabulous Kay Morris Matthews as guest curator in collaboration with Social History Curator, Gail Pope. Kay also wrote the book Lifting Horizons which accompanies the exhibition. We're pleased we will finally be able to see this exhibition up to celebrate this important milestone.

We will also be opening a new taonga Māori exhibition, Kuru Taonga: voices of Kahungunu. This exhibition explores the people and stories of Ngāti Kahungunu that are represented in the collections we hold.

MTG's Rongonui exhibition during 2019/2020 was very popular and for Kuru Taonga we have taken the same approach - focusing specifically on Ngāti Kahungunu. This exhibition will replace Tēnei Tonu in the front gallery and will be the first exhibition visitors see as they are welcomed back into the museum.

International Museums Day is on May 18 and it's fitting that we're able to announce our reopening around the same time. International Museums Day this year has a theme of The Future of Museums: Recover and Reimagine, which acknowledges the particular challenges in the museum and art gallery industry during and following Covid-19.

The cultural sector has been hit particularly hard by the impact of Covid-19 but it is also the sector best placed to help reconnect and reimagine, and to inspire communities and help with social and emotional healing.

The importance of human interaction, connection and caring has become more evident than ever and museums are looking at the role they play and the responsibility they have to their communities to operate in this space.

• Laura Vodanovich is MTG Director.