Chau Chak Wing Museum
The Chau Chak Wing Museum is a university museum at the University of Sydney, Australia.
It was formed as an amalgamation of the Nicholson Museum, the Macleay Museum, and the University Art Gallery in 2020.
History
The collections began with the Nicholson Collection of antiquities in 1860 and continued to grow to include the Macleay Collections of natural history, ethnography, science and historic photography, and the University Art Collection. The three collections were brought together under Sydney University Museums in 2003.The museum is named after Chau Chak Wing, a Chinese-Australian businessman who donated $15 million for the building's construction in 2015. Other major benefactors were Penelope Seidler, the Ian Potter Foundation and Nelson Meers Foundation. The museum was officially opened on the 18 November 2020.
In September 2023 it hosted the International Council of Museums Committee for University Museums and Collections Conference, "Truth-telling through university museums and collections".
The museum's collection of human remains from Egypt was featured in the second season of Stuff the British Stole.
Directors
- David Ellis
- Michael Dagostino
Building
Construction of the new museum was completed in 2020.
Collections
CCWM has three main collections, the Macleay Collection, the Nicholson Collection, and the University of Art Collection.Macleay Collection
The Macleay Collection is the oldest natural history collection in Australia, originating in the cabinets of Alexander Macleay, and expanding through the collecting networks of the Macleay family from Charles Darwin to Sir Stamford Raffles.It contains historically rich collections of Aboriginal, Torres Strait and Pacific Islanders' cultural material, including objects collected on the early scientific expedition, the Chevert, and those collected in the early years of anthropology at the University of Sydney.
The work of University of Sydney scientists is reflected in the collection of scientific instruments and apparatus used in research and teaching, and is part of the story of scientific practice in Australia.
The Historic Photograph Collection records life in Australia and the Pacific region, from the late 1840s to the 1960s, as captured by both commercial and amateur photographers. It includes a wide range of photographic formats, reflecting the changing technology of photography.
In addition, the Macleay Collections holds material reflecting the museum's history, including a significant library, furniture, documents and ephemera relating to the major collectors.
Nicholson Collection
The Nicholson Collection contains nearly 30,000 artefacts representing ancient cultures from the Mediterranean, North Africa, the Middle East and Europe. Spanning from the Palaeolithic to the late medieval period, these artefacts hold intimate stories of people's everyday lives, ancient environments, and cultural activity for over more than 10,000 years.The collection was founded in 1860 by Sir Charles Nicholson with a donation of Etruscan, Greek, Roman and Egyptian antiquities acquired to establish a museum, "calculated materially to promote the object for which the was founded." By 1870, the University of Sydney's Museum of Antiquities included over 3,000 artefacts and had been nicknamed the Nicholsonian Museum.
Over the past 160 years, the Nicholson Collection has expanded through ambitious acquisition programs, generous donation and private bequests. International excavations in Egypt, Cyprus and the Middle East, partly sponsored by the University of Sydney have also contributed significant objects to the collection.
University Art Collection
The collection contains more than 8000 works including paintings, sculptures, photography and ceramics. Among the first donors was one of its founders, Sir Charles Nicholson, who gave some 30 European paintings, tapestries and sculptures in 1865. The strength of the collection lies in Australian painting – including Indigenous art – as well as significant holdings in European and Asian art.Human remains
CCWM holds 950 identified human remains across its collections. This includes the remains of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, as well as remains from what is now the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Egypt, France, Palestine, Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, Timor, and Peru.Current exhibitions
- Ambassadors
- Crossroads - Ancient Cyprus
- Dance Protest, Project Banaba
- Hercules: Myth and Legacy
- Impressions of Greece
- Instrumental 4. Collections from Science: Physiology
- J.W. Power: Art, war and the avant-garde
- Kerameikos - the potters' quarter
- Mediterranean Identities: Across the wine-dark sea
- The Mummy Room
- Natural Selections: animal worlds
- Pharaonic Obsessions: Ancient Egypt, an Australian Story
- Roman Spectres
- Student Life: Max Dupain at the University of Sydney
- The trace is not a presence...
- Villages and Empires: Ancient Cultures of the Middle East
Past exhibitions
2025
- Contemporary Art Project #6. Consuelo Cavaniglia: seeing through you
- Micro:Macro - models of insight and inspiration
- Mungari: Fishing, Resistance, Return
- Union Made: Art from the University of Sydney Union
2024
- Barbara McGrady: Australia Has a Black History
- Chinese Toggles: Culture in Miniature
- Contemporary Art Project #5. Hayley Millar Baker: Nyctinasty
- Instrumental 3. Collections from Science: Surveying
- Ömie barkcloth: Pathways of nioge
- Photography and the performative
- The Staged Photograph
- Ten Thousand Suns
- Tidal Kin - Stories from the Pacific
2023
- Australian Seashores
- Coastline
- Contemporary Art Project #3. D Harding with Kate Harding: Through a lens of visitation
- Contemporary Art Project #4. Mikala Dwyer: Penelope and the Seahorse
- Instrumental 2. Collections from science: Optical instruments
- Object/Art/Specimen
- Sentient Paper
- Sherman Gift
2022
- Animal Gods: Classics and Classification
- Contemporary Art Project #2. Sarah Goffman: Applied Arts
- Instrumental 1. Collections from science: Calculating and Computing
- Kamay spears: Yesterday, today, and tomorrow
- Light & Darkness
- Pacific views
2021
- The Business of Photography
- Contemporary Art Project #1. Daniel Boyd: Pediment/Impediment
- Gululu dhuwala djalkiri: welcome to the Yolŋu foundations
Awards