MONA (Museum of Old and New Art)

The best way to arrive at Mona is by ferry from Hobart, crossing the Derwent towards what looks, at first, like a rather restrained cluster of buildings on a sandstone peninsula. Then the ground opens up. Fender Katsalidis buried much of David Walsh’s museum across three subterranean levels, removing some 60,000 tonnes of earth and sandstone so the existing modernist buildings by Roy Grounds could retain their prominence.

The backstory is suitably eccentric. Walsh first opened a small museum of antiquities here. Almost nobody came. His response was to build something vastly more ambitious. Mona opened in 2011 and still behaves as though conventional museum etiquette were merely a suggestion. Ancient objects meet provocative contemporary works, there are no traditional wall labels, and the location aware O app tells you what is nearby if you want explanations.

Inside, raw sandstone, concrete, steel, tunnels and dark voids make orientation slightly uncertain, deliberately so. Outside await the Moorilla winery, restaurants, bars and broad Derwent views. Even the ferry has sheep shaped seats.