Free Art

Fig tree in The domain, behind the Art Gallery of New South Wales.

Now, here's something interesting I read in the paper yesterday. Apparently, the Art Gallery of NSW, with 1.3 million visitors last year, was more often visited than the Guggenheim in New York, Vienna's Kunsthistorisches Museum, the Pergamon Museum in Berlin and the Getty Museum in Los Angeles. More here. (But wasn't the Guggenheim closed part of last year? And the Getty's visitors are self-restricting because it's hard to get to by public transport and you have to book a parking space ahead. Surely this can't be Australian cultural cringe/hype?)

Best of all, the AGNSW is free for permanent exhibitions. Every year the AGNSW has a coompetition for portraiture called the Archibald prize

Are art museums free where you are? For me, the greatest free museums in the world are the British Museum and the National Gallery in London. The Metropolitan in New York suggests a donation, but it is not compulsory.

I'm one of those people who believe that culture, education and knowledge should be free for all - paid for by a progressive tax system - public libraries, art museums, museums.

[And apropos of none of that - today is the last day of summer; our seasons here change officially on 1 March, 1 June, 1 Sep and 1 Dec. And in Sydney, autumn is my favourite].