[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://padnws01.mcmaster.ca/images/Museum08.jpg” caption=”As part of their new strategic plan, the McMaster Museum of Art is working on ways to partner with academic departments and campus organizations to communicate the richness of its collection to the entire campus community.”]When a company with a roster of cultural heavy-hitters such as the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, the Tate Modern and the Louvre gushes about the high caliber of your art collection you know you have something special.

That was the reaction of Lord Cultural Resources when they embarked on a strategic plan of McMaster's Museum of Art. The organization undertakes specialized planning for international arts and culture groups.

“Across Canada, there are about 40 institutions that have galleries attached to them, including McMaster,” says Carol Podedworny, the Museum's director/curator. “Everyone has something distinctive, but Lord was especially complimentary about us. For one, we have a museum-standard building, which impressed them. But when they said, 'You've got one of the best collections in the country', they weren't just talking about our collection but about the fact that our collection was consciously built around research as well as display.”

However, a fabulous collection is meaningless when it exists in isolation, and Podedworny says that one of the important directions emerging from Lord's assessment was how to communicate the richness of the collection to the entire McMaster campus.

To that end, Podedworny and her team are already working on ways to partner with academic departments and campus organizations. In September, a joint venture with Physics & Astronomy will produce Light Echo, a recreation of a supernova that occurred during the Renaissance. Currently under development is an art appreciation course for family medicine residents to sharpen their communications and diagnostic skills.

The Museum will also create special events for students, staff and alumni to encourage visits to the Museum's collection, and it will participate in local and regional promotional activities to draw in the general public. In addition, Podedworny hopes to seek partnerships with like-minded museums around the world that have a research component in their mandate.

“The [strategic plan] exercise has opened a lot of exciting possibilities for us,” says Podedworny.

The Museum's strategic plan is the first conducted in its 40-year history.