Wikipedia:Peer review/Museum of Contemporary Art Australia/archive1

Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

I've listed this article for peer review because I have added a significant amount of text (over 2000 words) and a number of pictures and info tables. I have done so for a university assignment and would love for my work to be reviewed and to receive feedback! I would love feedback on any grammar, punctuation, citing or structure issues. Thank you so much for your time! Thanks, LibraryofEphesus (talk) 04:49, 30 May 2021 (UTC)

OK, your article has been here for almost three months. It looks like something worth taking a look at ... I'll print it out, do some light copy editing, and tell you what I think. Give me a few days. Daniel Case (talk) 05:54, 26 August 2021 (UTC)

Alright ...

@LibraryofEphesus: You haven't edited in three months, but I hope you're still checking in and reading this.

On your talk page someone gave you a barnstar for your school work on this article, expressing the hope you could get it to GA.

I think you can too, but it has a few more stops to get past before it reaches that station. And that's after I gave this a little help. (The nice thing about PR is that the reviewer can roll up his/her/their sleeves and make substantial edits to the article; you can't do that at GAN or FAC).

As a general rule when you expand an article and then submit it for something like GA, you need to go through the rest of the article and make sure the whole thing reads like it was written by the same person, at least, that it uses consistent terminology and spelling and is in MOS conformance. Also, it's a good idea to expand the intro so that it summarizes the article as it now stands ... you can see that I took care of that.

I also added photos, choosing a better one of the new wing for the infobox, getting a copy of the actual logo as a transparent .PNG for the infobox as well, and adding more images in the history section of where the museum has been in the past. It's an art museum; the article could really use pictures.

So, some issues that I'm not comfortable resolving entirely by myself:

• The history section still needs some work. First, it currently reads as if Power's bequest was just money for the acquisition of art, but later it seems to imply that he left the museum-to-be some (or all?) of his collection as well. This needs to be cleared up.

• Also, if the museum was his collection for those early years, where was it until 1970? And why did US not build the art museum into its performing arts center? Why were the library, and later the Madsen Building, chosen? Why was the collection moved? Were any works added to it (besides the ones mentioned in the collections section)? If it was a travelling collection, were any works from it loaned out to other institutions? Who was in charge? Was there anyone whose dedicated job it was to oversee the collection? Did US administration want to get it off campus? I think you need to do a deep dive into all the relevant newspaper archives (the SMH, whatever publication US puts out, and the art magazines you've relied on), to fill in the gaps in what feels like a very superficial account.

• It would be nice if somewhere, we could put in some interior grafs, or pictures of artwork that might not be copyrighted. They'd work well in the collections section.

• I know it took a lot of work and I really hate to ask, but ... are you really sure we need that section on the transport connections? Wikipedia is not a travel guide, and this sort of information is why we have Wikivoyage (Speaking of which, at that page for The Rocks, there is nothing about the museum. I've worked on Wikivoyage (but not in a while) so if you'd like me to add something, I'd be happy to ... hey, I already moved the Commons cat to the right name). Maybe instead of that whole section we could just have a link to the WV The Rocks page from the xlinks section.

OK.

I am also thinking of something I wanted to at least propose here first.

The museum's notability comes not only from its existence as a cultural institution but its occupancy of a historic, heritage-listed building. It is important as architecture, not just as a museum.

So ... in keeping with other articles about buildings, I'd like to make the first section after the intro be about the building. I'd like to write a detailed architectural description of both the MSB building and the new wing, sourced to the photos and the NSW heritage page. This is not at all different from the many articles I've written about NRHP-listed properties here in the U.S. (and some on the Canadian equivalent); it also seems like whoever designed that form for the state listing was drawing on the same forms our National Park Service uses.

And with it I'd also write a graf or two about the neighborhood, since the context of any building is important architecturally. Especially when it's in a neighborhood like this one. I can't see why we wouldn't ... I mean, the MCA has a fantastic setting. Looking north you've got this view, with the bridge and the waterfront, and to the south you've got the CBD skyline as a backdrop. Those would be great pics to illustrate such a section.

If you haven't said anything, in a couple of weeks I might just go ahead with this. It'd put the article closer to GA (although we still need more substantial history).

In the meantime you might want to look at other GAs about art museums, like specifically this one.

Happy editing! Hope you can get back to it soon! Daniel Case (talk) 05:55, 30 August 2021 (UTC)