One of Australia’s most anticipated museum projects, Powerhouse Parramatta, will finally open its doors to the public on 7 November. Organisers have announced that the site will be open 9am to 9pm seven days a week—and 24 hours a day for “residents” such as artists and researchers staying on site. Touted as a cultural “crown jewel” for western Sydney and located 20km from the city in Parramatta, the A$915 million institution has been 12 years in the making. When completed it will be the largest museum ever built in the state of New South Wales. The project has its roots in the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences that was founded in Sydney in 1879. Its move west to a major new building is happening as part of a New South Wales Government drive to spread the arts and culture budget more equitably across the city. During a site visit in June, during which artisans were still abseiling down the building’s vast steel exoskeleton, Powerhouse’s chief executive officer Lisa Havilah told The Art Newspaper that Powerhouse Parramatta will be full of life around the clock. The 30,000 sq. m. building incorporates 30 residential apartments where scientists, artists and researchers can live and work on site for up to three months. At any one time, 60 school children will sleep in the museum’s student accommodation for two nights while undertaking curriculum-aligned learning. “Every night there will be 90 to 95 people staying,” Havilah said.“It makes it a 24-hour precinct. There’s no precedent that I know of.” From outer space to Westfield shopping centres Powerhouse will be free entry, but a paid ticket will be required for one of the institution’s five inaugural exhibitions, Task Eternal. Lenders to this exhibition, focused on humanity’s explorations of outer space, include Nasa, the Smithsonian and the British Museum. Speaking to the disorientating experience of being in space, the American artist James Turrell has created an immersive work for Task Eternal titled Shangri La...