The Ashmolean, Blist’s Hill and Herbert Museum and Art Gallery have all beaten by the rejuvenated Ulster Museum in Belfast to the £100,000 Art Fund Prize for the museum of the year

The Ulster Museum was one of a generation of Victorian patrician institutions based on the enthusiasms of local history and botanical societies whose collections were installed in large and forbidding neo-classical piles that tended to shout “Keep Out!” to anyone not of a certain scholarly standing.

That it has pipped populist displays like Ironbridge Gorge’s Blist’s Hill (the recreation of a 19th century town), the transformed academic faculty that is Oxford’s Ashmolean, and Coventry’s Herbert which is already the Guardian’s Family Friendly museum of the year, says everything about how the Belfast contender has shaken off its austere grandeur.

“We were moved and invigorated by our visit to the Ulster Museum” said Kirsty Young, the chair of the judges who were Kathy Gee, museums and heritage adviser; A C Grayling, professor of philosophy at Birkbeck College, London; Steve Jones, professor of genetics at University College London; Sally Osman, former director of communications, at the BBC; Lars Tharp, director of the Foundling Museum; and the artist Jonathan Yeo.

“Here” said Young “is a museum that shows how much can be achieved, and one that is building a lasting legacy. We were impressed by the interactive learning spaces on each level that are filled with objects which visitors are encouraged to touch and explore, and by how the museum’s commitment to reaching all parts of its community is reflected in the number and diversity of its visitors. The transformed Ulster Museum is an emblem of the confidence and cultural rejuvenation of Northern Ireland.”

And Stephen Deuchar, director of the sponsor, the Art Fund, added: “Ulster Museum is a brilliant example of a museum that is passionate about its public. The redevelopment is stunning, capturing its visitors’ minds and hearts with exceptional creative flair.”

The Ulster Museum re-opened last October after a three year refurbishment costing £17.5m.

It was first founded in 1821 and opened 12 years later in a purpose-built neo-classical building in the Botanic Gardens as the Belfast Municipal Museum and Art Gallery. It was the traditional, general museum popular with the Victorians which sprang up in our major cities overt the century, with five sections devoted to antiquities, geology, botany, arts and local history.

It became the Ulster Museum with national recognition by Act of Parliament in 1962, with an extension opened in 1964, and in recent years it has been building up its contemporary art holdings.

In 1998 the museum merged with Ulster Folk and Transport Museum and the Ulster-American Museum to form the National Museums and Galleries of Northern Ireland.

But in 2006 it closed for its refurbishment, reopening three years later with a new 23-metre high entrance atrium with glass and steel walkways leading into a series of galleries visible at once at different levels, dominated by a Window on Our World giant display tower, scaling four levels and housing the most iconic objects from across the museum’s collections.

The Window on Our World includes the Chambers Car and Edmontosaurus dinosaur - the most complete real dinosaur fossil on display in Ireland – as well as smaller objects such as a Viking brooch, gold coins from the Armada treasures; exotic butterflies and bugs from the nature collection.

Using new technology, the display tower also projects 360 degree audio images onto the four walls of the gallery.



A new restaurant has been created with a terrace leading out into Botanic Gardens, integrating the museum and the gardens.

There are also three new interactive learning zones and a new high-level gallery for the display of glass, ceramics, silver and jewellery.



One of the museum’s most famous objects is the 7th century BC Egyptian mummy, Takabuti, newly conserved and brought back on display, as the centrepiece of a new display exploring life and death in ancient Egypt.

For the first time, The Art Fund Prize website hosted a poll asking the public to vote for their favourite nominated museum or gallery, and to received 73,000 votes and over 40,000 comments. In May, the Ulster Museum was also chosen as the best permanent exhibition at the annual UK Museums and Heritage Awards.

“This is the first time in Northern Ireland’s history that a prestigious cultural prize of this nature has been awarded to an institution in the region” said Tim Cooke, director of National Museums Northern Ireland. “This prize will encourage us as we endeavour to play a meaningful role at the heart of our changing
society.”

“Rejuvenating the Ulster Museum in Belfast has been a deeply rewarding and purposeful experience coinciding with a remarkable period of change in Northern Ireland’s history. The public appetite for the new space and for engagement with our collections has been huge – as evidenced by the record visitor numbers and the massive level of support for the public vote element of The Art Fund Prize.”