Museum Prize nominations announced

The most important criteria for being nominated for a Museum Prize is an institution’s attention to accessibility in presenting its collection and its ability to successfully engage and connect with the public or with specific target groups. Past Museum Prize winners include the Museum of Industry, Labour and Textile (MIAT) in Ghent, Leuven’s M Museum and Brussels’ Musical Instruments Museum and Horta Museum.

This year’s nominations for Flanders are the Belle Époque Centre in Blankenberge, which immerses visitors in the coast’s glory days between 1870 and 1914; Bruges’ Groeninge Museum, with its six centuries of Belgian art, including seminal works by Jan Van Eyck and Hans Memling; Gaasbeek Castle in Flemish Brabant (pictured), decorated in 19th-century style and with an extensive collection of art and a unique historical garden; Tongeren’s Gallo-Roman Museum, which lures visitors in with realistic installations of half a million years of history; and Antwerp’s Red Star Line Museum, an interactive story relating the history of European emigration to the New World.

Museums nominated in Brussels include Autoworld at Jubelpark; the Bibliotheca Wittockiana bookbinding museum in Sint-Pieters-Woluwe; the new Fin-de-Siècle Museum in the museum district; city museum Broodhuis in Grote Markt and the René Magritte Museum in Jette (not to be confused with the Magritte Museum at the Museum of Fine Arts).

The public can also vote online for any of Belgium’s museums to win the Public Prize. Children, meanwhile, can vote for museums that appeal to them for a separate prize. The Museum Prize will be announced on 3 June.