Forest and Heritage Centre, Geeveston
The Forest and Heritage Centre in Geevston are looking to introduce a range of new products for display and sale. The Centre has recently been refurbished and is a focal point for tourist activity in the South with over 40,000 visitors per year. If you are interested in displaying and selling your work read on below and contact Roland Schibig for further information.
Background
Forestry Tasmania assumed management of the Forest and Heritage Centre, Geeveston, in June 2010. The Centre serves currently as a booking office for all adventure forests sites, with the ground floor containing a retail section with focus on products selling to the tourist market. Products on sale also include speciality island timer product, the work of some local artist and furniture made by the southern design centre.
The rest of the ground floor space houses a temporary interpretive exhibition about the timber industry in the Geeveston area, while funding is sought to develop a more comprehensive multimedia tourist experience.
With the upstairs floor focusing now on wood turning machine, in particular the Vin Smith collection, continue that theme by incorporating the entire Forest and heritage centre could be considered a logical progression.
The upstairs floor has been repaired through the city council, received a makeover with a proper clean up and all walls have been painted. This section of the building presents itself beautifully, and has been open to the public for over 4 months, primary focusing on the unfinished Vince Smith Collection. The Huon Valley Council expressed its concern to Forestry Tasmania that the Vince
Smith Collection of woodworking machines, which is housed on the second floor of the centre and of major significance to the community, was not being adequately curated or interpreted.
Forestry Tasmania responded to this concern by offering to develop, as a community service to Geeveston, an interpretation plan that would guide the development of a display that would increase the community’s, and wider public’s, appreciation of the Collection’s values, which has now been completed. The art society is now in the progress of applying for a community grant through the community heritage grant application process.
The aim of this plan is to provide a framework for transforming the Vince Smith Collection into a meaningful visitor experience, by identifying the Collection’s values, setting interpretive goals and themes, defining target audiences, and by providing a concept for interpretive media.
As previously mentioned, the focus needs now to shift to the ground floor. The available space would be suited to extend the retail and wood craft section, with focus on art, incorporation timber products. We have our resident artists, John Osborne, working out of the Centre. His focus is line carving, print and timber framing.
We are now looking for expression of interest of talented Tasmanian artists working primarily with timber, who would be interested to display their work, or work out of the Centre on a permanent basis.
The centre has around 40000 visitors a year, so the potential of selling products is excellent.
For further information of the express your interest, pleased contact
Roland.schibig@forestrytas.com.au
04185 574 272
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