The weekly feature rounds up the latest updates in museum appointments, openings, funding and new exhibitions from across the UK.
Museum Moves is supported by DJW Projects Limited: DJW Projects Limited. DJW Projects Limited is recognised as one of the UK’s leading forces in the audio-visual industry, providing creative lighting, Audio Visual and multimedia solutions globally to achieve the ultimate technological experience, using sound, lighting, vision and interaction.
Museum Moves 13 – 20 March 2025
Appointments
Bristol educational charity and science centre, We The Curious, has appointed an AI specialist as its new chair of trustees.New appointment Tom Betts is a specialist in machine learning and AI – holding a master’s degree in informatics from the University of Edinburgh and a bachelor’s degree in artificial intelligence and computer science from the University of Sussex.
AI specialist appointed chair of trustees at Bristol’s We The Curious
The Science Museum has appointed a new Head of Collections and Principal Curator.
Dr Glyn Morgan will officially lead the museum’s curatorial, research and library and archives teams from 1 May 2025, replacing Jessica Bradford, who is moving on to the Natural History Museum.
Science Museum appoints head of collections and principal curator
Openings and closures
The Booth Museum of Natural History will close from April 2025 to improve its collections, visitor experience, and infrastructure. The project will address collection management challenges, improve storage, and enhance building systems. The museum will host special event days and continue school visits during the closure.
The Vagina Museum is to remain open after finances threatened its future last week. The museum surpassed a £60k crowdfunding goal in a single weekend, ending fears it may be forced to permanently close.
Exhibitions
The National Coal Mining Museum in Wakefield displays a new outdoor exhibition ‘Animating the Collection’ featuring artwork created by local schoolchildren from Horbury and Middlestown Primary Schools in collaboration with artists Lenny and Whale. The exhibition showcases eight interactive pictures inspired by the museum’s art collection including works by Tom McGuinness, Marjorie Arnfield and Jack Cyril Ifold, with augmented reality elements viewable through the Artivive App. The exhibition is currently on display with interactive workshops planned during Easter holidays.
The Natural History Museum in London has opened its new exhibition ‘Space: Could Life Exist Beyond Earth?’ which provides visitors with the opportunity to touch a fragment of the Moon, hold a piece of Mars and handle the Allende meteorite that predates Earth itself. The exhibition will feature specimens including the rare Ivuna meteorite, interactive games, and sensory experiences allowing visitors to guide a rover over Martian terrain and smell the scents of outer space. The exhibition runs from 16 May 2025 – 22 February 2026.
Thinktank in Birmingham will host the touring exhibition,’The Space Vault Exhibition’ featuring one of the UK’s largest private collections of human space exploration artefacts, including mission checklists from Apollo 13, Commander Dave Scott’s spacesuit umbilical, and Lunar dust from Apollo 15. Visitors will journey through 12 curated stories of space exploration via immersive visuals and unique objects from NASA’s Apollo missions, Soviet space era, space shuttle programmes, International Space Station and SpaceX. The exhibition runs from 14 June 2025, after its time at the River & Rowing Museum.
An exhibition exploring the life of May Morris, daughter of William Morris, will showcase her talents as an embroiderer, designer, and socialist advocate. The display at Russell-Cotes Art Gallery & Museum in Bournemouth features original Morris & Co. wallpaper and embroidery designs, highlighting her artistic contributions and advocacy for women in the arts. The exhibition ‘May Morris: Art & Advocacy’ runs from 5 April 2025 – 5 October 2025.
The National Portrait Gallery in London presents ‘Jenny Saville: The Anatomy of Painting’, the first major UK museum exhibition dedicated to this foremost contemporary painter. Showcasing 50 works including oil paintings and charcoal drawings, the exhibition traces Saville’s artistic development and explores her fascination with flesh, anatomy and the painting process. The exhibition runs from 20 June 2025 – 7 September 2025.
Arctic Indigenous artistry reflecting beauty and environmental challenges will be showcased in ‘Arctic Expressions’ at Kirkleatham Museum, Redcar. The exhibition features 15 works including a seal decoy helmet from Captain Cook’s voyage, artwork by Erin Ggaadimits Ivalu Gingrich, and lithographs by acclaimed Inuit artist Kenojuak Ashevak. The exhibition runs from 7 June – 28 September 2025.
Emma Talbot’s largest-ever UK show ‘How We Learn to Love’ will showcase over 20 new and recent works including drawings, paintings, poetical texts, animations and sculptures at Compton Verney. The exhibition explores pressing contemporary issues through a personal lens, featuring monumental silk paintings, sculptural works and animations such as ‘The Human Experience’, ‘The Tragedies’, and ‘Grief Provokes the Most Profound Love’. The exhibition runs from 5 July – 5 October 2025.
Funding
The latest round of the Weston Loan Programme with Art Fund has been announced, which will see national treasures travel to 11 regional museums and galleries across the UK – reuniting iconic works with the people and places that inspired them. A total of £321,014 has been awarded. Now in its ninth year, the programme is the first UK-wide initiative funding smaller museums to borrow major works from national institutions – supporting costs from transportation to conservation. This year’s exhibitions include loans from Tate, the British Museum, the Royal Academy, and more, travelling to regional museums from the Outer Hebrides to Suffolk.
