Maidstone Museum will be hosting a month-long range of activities during the summer holidays – each with a different theme.

Kicking off events will be dinosaur week where children can get their claws stuck into a number of fun activities.

Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Cllr Richard Ash, said: “This range of dinosaur activites is not only a great way to kick off the month of events at the museum but will keep kids amused during the summer break. The museum always caters for young children during the holiday periods and this time is no exception. So come on kids get down to the best museum in the south east and have fun.”

Highlights during the week of fossil-themed activites include:

Making glove claws
Monday, August 2
Under 12’s/Drop in/£2
10.30am – 12.30pm and 1.30 – 3.30pm
Recommended for under 12’s.
Cost £2

Pop-Up Dinosaurs
Wednesday, August 4
Under 12’s/Drop in/£2
10.30am – 12.30pm and 1.30pm – 3.30pm
Recommended for under 12’s.
Cost £2

Fossil Dinosaur Footprints
Thursday, August 5
Under 12’s/Drop in/£2
10.30am – 12.30pm and 1.30pm – 3.30pm
Recommended for under 12’s.
Cost £2

Free Friday’s
Friday, August 6
This one bites! Hands-on Station
Under 12’s/Drop in/Free
10.30am – 12.30pm and 1.30pm – 3.30pm
Recommended for under 12’s.
Cost Free

For more information visit www.museum.maidstone.gov.uk
or call 01622 602838

Maidstone Museum’s major boost from Heritage
Lottery Fund
It is one of South-East England’s most important local museums with impressive visitor numbers and a vast collection of artefacts. Now Maidstone Museum and Bentlif Art Gallery has been awarded a grant of almost £2 million by the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) to enable the next stage of its development to get underway.

The museum and its associated art gallery has a large collection of 660,000 objects. These range from a 2,700-year-old Eqyptian mummy, the chair used by Napoleon Bonaparte during his exile on St Helena, stone age tools up to 400,000 years old and other archaeological finds dating from the Bronze and Iron ages, and Roman and Saxon times.

There are 40 old master drawings, bronzes by Jacob Epstein and Henry Moore and rare Japanese woodcut prints, including the famous image Great Wave off Kanagawa by Hokasai.

Maidstone Borough Council’s Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Councillor Brian Moss, said: “The Heritage Lottery Fund has recognised the regional importance of Maidstone’s museum and the innovative design which will attract visitors from far and near. The improvements to display space will ensure a visit is exciting for the whole family. The educational suite will improve and increase the facilities for schools visits and this extra space will allow more exhibitions and talks for those of all ages. We are delighted that this project part of our regeneration ambition for Maidstone will now quickly push ahead.”

For the Heritage Lottery Fund, Head of HLF South East England Stuart McLeod said: “ This project will help the museum go from strength to strength, enabling it to put much more of its extensive collection on public display. It will also allow an increase in its learning facilities which are currently operating at full capacity.”

The East Wing project will create a new museum entrance, improve visitor facilities, upgrade internal exhibition spaces and provide better storage areas. A new education suite will enhance the museum’s learning facilities and, for the first time, there will be level wheelchair access to the galleries.

The redevelopment plans will create 30% more display space in the East Wing enabling the museum to display much more of its vast collections than at present and will help swell audience numbers from the current annual total of more than 80,000 to an anticipated 120,000 by 2012. The work will also refurbish and rationalise the museum stores so that collection storage and conservation can be improved.

Maidstone Museum opened in 1858 making it one of the earliest town museums in the country. Part of it is housed in a Grade II* listed Tudor mansion including a great hall that dates from 1564 and an even earlier cloister. The buildings have been extended a number of times and much of the present structure is Victorian.

Work on the latest redevelopment is due to begin in March next year and be completed in July 2011.

Picture: (L-R) Edwin Boorman (Chairman of the Maidstone Trust), Cllr Chris Garland (Leader of the council), Sheena Vick (Deputy Director of Operations at the HLF), Cllr Brian Moss (Cabinet Member for Lesiure and Culture) and Simon Lace (Museum and Heritage manager).

The chair, according to the museum’s Accession Register, was donated by Alexander Randall, in about 1866.  Alexander Randall was a local councillor and instrumental in the foundation of the museum. He was responsible for many interesting objects coming to the museum, including the much loved Lady Godiva statue.

The chair was brought back to England by Rev. Richard Boys, who was then Chaplain to the Governor of St Helena and who subsequently became Vicar of Loose.  When he died, it was donated to the Museum via Mr Randall.

Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Cllr Brian Moss, said: “This is one of many interesting things we have found while packing the stores ready for the East Wing development. It’s an exciting time for the museum as we prepare to display all of these finds once the extension is complete.”

The chair, a mahogany bergere chair, was on display in the Brenchley Room at the museum until it was put into storage in 1996. It dates from the beginning of the 19th Century.

Cllr Moss added: “The chair is in good condition apart from its cane seating which will need restoring. There is also damage to the right arm of the chair, which was allegedly caused by Napoleon scraping it with a knife.

“It has a really interesting story and it will soon be on display in the East Wing extension.”

Japanese collections given more cash help

Maidstone Musuem’s Japanese collection has been given its second cash boost in two months.

After being awarded £7,500 from the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council at the beginning of April, the collection has now secured a further £2,000 from The Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation. 

Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Cllr Brian Moss, said: “This money was secured in mid-May and will be used to develop new educational resources for schools and visitors of all ages. This is really great news for the museum and will help further improve the collection. I’m really pleased we have secured this funding.”

The new education resources will be launched in early 2010 prior to the East Wing extension being developed.

Pictures: Logo of The Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation and a red lacquer bowl with fish.

A much-loved television artist has been honoured with a plaque unveiling at the Hazlitt Arts Centre.

To coincide with the Hazlitt’s first birthday celebrations on Saturday (May 30), a plaque was unveiled to remember Maidstone-born artist, Tony Hart.
Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Cllr Brian Moss, said: “Saturday was a very joyous occasion and I was delighted to be able to unveil this lasting tribute to a man who has captured the hearts of so many people.

“This commemorative plaque will be a permanent reminder of a well-known local artist. Tony Hart was born in Hastings Road and the arts centre is a fitting venue in which to commemorate him and tied in well with it celebrating its first year as an arts centre.”

Born in Maidstone in 1925 Tony Hart’s television career spanned 50 years. He is best remembered for his role with the BBC as a television artist in a variety of programmes, including ‘Vision On’, ‘Smart Hart’ and ‘Hart Beat’. In 1984 his BBC programme ‘Take Hart’, won a BAFTA and he received a Lifetime Achievement award in 1998.

His daughter Carolyn Williams also attended the unveiling.

See a video of the unveiling at www.youtube.com/user/maidstonecouncil

Picture:(L-R) Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Toy Hart’s daughter Carolyn Williams and the Mayor of Maidstone, Cllr Peter Parvin.

Museum bags another Albert Goodwin painting with help from The Art Fund
Maidstone Museum is now displaying an early oil painting by Maidstone artist Albert Goodwin (1845-1932).

Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Cllr Brian Moss explained how the painting was bought at auction in February and paid for entirely through grant funding.

He said: “The Art Fund, the UK’s leading independent art charity, has supported the purchase with a grant of £6,050. The remainder of the purchase price of £5,200 was provided by the Victoria & Albert Museum and the Museum, Libraries and Archive Council’s Purchase Fund and the Museum Auxiliary Fund.”

The painting ‘A Baptism of Flowers, Youth is full of sport age’s breath is short,’ was completed in 1877 and was the 13th oil painting Albert Goodwin exhibited at the Royal Academy.

The painting is an example of how Goodwin absorbed the colour palette and techniques of the Pre-Raphaelite artists with whom he had been working with, and contrasts with his later looser more expressive painting style.

Maidstone Museum has the largest collection of works by Albert Goodwin in public hands, with more than 215 works by the artist.

David Barrie, Director of The Art Fund, said: “This painting, with its unusually evocative title, is a significant addition to Maidstone Museum. Since Goodwin rarely painted faces, the superb detail in the peasants’ features makes this an important work, and its display in the collection helps to demonstrate the evolution of Goodwin’s style.”

Cllr Moss added: “The collection is predominantly watercolours and drawings but this oil painting, the first in nearly fifty years, is a fantastic addition to the collection.” 

The painting can now be seen on display in the museum’s Bentlif 1 gallery.