The Queensland Cultural Centre (QCC) is a heritage-listed cultural centre on Grey Street in South Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It is part of the South Bank precinct located on the Brisbane River, and was built from 1976 onwards, in time for the 1988 World's Fair.
The centre comprises the Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC), the Queensland Museum, the State Library of Queensland (SLQ), the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG) and the Queensland Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA). The original part was designed by Brisbane architects Robin Gibson and Partners and opened in 1985.QPAC – Robin Gibson & Partners . Australian Institute of Architectics. The centre is surrounded by subtropical gardens and features cafes, restaurants, bookstores, and other public facilities.
The southwestern portion of the centre was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 12 June 2015. The Heritage Register includes the Queensland Performing Arts Centre, the Queensland Museum, the Queensland Art Gallery, but does not include the newer Queensland Gallery of Modern Art or the renovated State Library of Queensland.
History The Queensland Cultural Centre (QCC), located on the south bank of the Brisbane River across from the central business district, is a cultural facility. The facility is built in a modernist architectural style. It was designed between 1976 and 1998 by architect Robin Gibson in collaboration with the Queensland Department of Public Works.
The Cultural Centre includes the Queensland Art Gallery (1982), the Queensland Performing Arts Centre (1984), the Queensland Museum (1986), the Queensland State Library, and the former Fountain Room Restaurant and Auditorium (1988), now State Library of Queensland's 'The Edge' (2015). The substantially-altered State Library and Gallery of Modern Art are part of the broader Cultural District, but are not heritage-listed.
South Brisbane before the Queensland Cultural Centre
Prior to European settlement, the entire South Brisbane Peninsula was known as Kurilpa, an important gathering place for the Yuggera/Jagera people. The tip of the South Brisbane Peninsula was a traditional river crossing. After the establishment of the Moreton Bay Penal settlement in 1825, convicts cleared the river flats to grow crops for the settlement and in the 1830s timber was exported from the south bank to Sydney.
From the 1840s, South Brisbane emerged as one of the most important locations for port activity in Queensland, initially aided by direct access to the Darling Downs and Ipswich. As maritime trade expanded, shipyards and warehouses were gradually built along the river. Over time, a range of commercial, light industrial, and manufacturing activities also developed, as well as civic and residential uses.
The area prospered in the 1880s and South Brisbane became a municipality (the Borough of South Brisbane) in 1888. As part of the development boom, a dry dock was opened in 1881, coal wharves and associated rail links were built, and South Brisbane railway station was established as the terminus for suburban and rural trains.
By the end of the 19th century, the area had developed into a substantial urban settlement, with Stanley Street as a major retail centre and thoroughfare.
In 1911, the Cremorne Theatre (then called the Cremorne Gardens) opened where the Queensland Art Gallery now stands, on Stanley Street, South Brisbane.Some sources state that the Cremorne Theatre was located where QPAC now stands. However, Peel Street was located on the opposite side of Melbourne Street where Stanley Street no longer exists. It was used mostly for vaudeville, variety shows and for occasional drama productions. By mid-1952, the building was remodeled to be used as office and storage space for film rental companies. In 1954, it burnt down and was never rebuilt. The current Cremorne Theatre in the Queensland Cultural Centre was named in its honour.
By the late 1960s, much of South Brisbane, especially along the river, was in economic decline due to the reorientation of economic activity and transport networks. Shipyards, stores, and rail sidings were closed and subsequently demolished as shipping increasingly moved downriver. The decline of such a centrally located area in the capital provided an opportunity for extensive urban renewal.
Impetus for the Queensland Cultural Centre
Pressure to address the lack of adequate cultural facilities in Queensland increased in the 1960s as public awareness of the importance of the arts to the cultural health of the community grew. At that time, Queensland's major cultural institutions were located in buildings and sites in Brisbane that did not meet their current or future needs. The first purpose-built museum opened on William Street in 1879, but proved inadequate from the start. It was converted to the Public Library of Queensland (the State Library from 1971) in 1900–02, after the 1889 Exhibition Building at Bowen Hills was converted for use as a Museum in 1900. From 1895, the Queensland Art Gallery was housed in the Brisbane Town Hall, moving in 1905 to a purpose designed room on the third floor in the new Executive Building overlooking George Street. When the new City Hall was completed in 1930, the Concert Hall at the Museum building was remodeled to house the art gallery.
Until the opening of the Queensland Cultural Centre, there were no government-run performing arts facilities in Queensland. Most music and theatre performances were initially held in local venues such as art schools, churches, or town halls, which had varying degrees of suitability. Purpose-built facilities were limited and were constructed only in larger centres. By the 1880s, Brisbane had four theatres, of which the 2700-seat Opera House (later Her Majesty's Theatre ), built in 1888, was the most magnificent and prestigious. The Exhibition Building was one of the first buildings designed specifically for musical performances and contained a concert hall with a four-manual pipe organ. It became the centre for major musical events until the opening of the Brisbane City Hall in 1930.
Throughout Australia in the postwar period, major arts development projects were undertaken by governments at all levels, including stand-alone and integrated projects for institutions such as libraries, theatres, and art galleries. The sites for such projects were often in centrally located areas where previous uses and activities were in decline or had become redundant. This type of urban renewal provided a blank slate for development, where the existing layout could be reconfigured and the built environment reshaped. Construction of the Sydney Opera House began in 1959; preliminary investigations for the Adelaide Festival Centre began in 1964; the National Gallery of Australia was established in 1967; the first phase of the Victorian Arts Centre, the National Gallery of Victoria, was completed in 1969; and the Civic Centre in Perth was also developed in the 1960s.
In Queensland in the 1930s, there was an earlier phase of civic buildings (primarily town halls and council chambers) that often included spaces for arts and cultural activities. In the early 1950s, architect and urban planner Karl Langer designed town centres for larger regional centres such as Mackay, Toowoomba and Kingaroy.
Several attempts were made to build stately cultural institutions in the Queensland capital, but all failed. The construction of an art gallery and museum near the entrance to Government Domain on land granted in 1863 never materialized. In the 1890s, a major architectural competition was held for a museum and art gallery on land in Albert Park to meet the need for adequate space. In 1934, on a nearby site along Wickham Park and Turbot Street, an ambitious urban design proposal to incorporate a public art gallery, library and dental hospital resulted only in the construction of the Brisbane Dental Hospital. Post-World War II plans to incorporate the art gallery into the extensions to the original Supreme Court Building did not come to fruition. The Queensland Art Gallery Act of 1959 paved the way for a new board of trustees to establish the gallery with public funds subsidized by the government. The proposal at that time, for a gallery and performance hall at Gardens Point, to mark Queensland's centenary, was not realised; however, an extension to the State Library proceeded and included an exhibition hall and reading rooms.
A proposal for a State Gallery and Centre for Allied Arts, on the former municipal markets site adjacent to the Roma Street railway station, formed part of a government backed plan for the redevelopment of the Roma Street area. Prepared by Bligh Jessup Bretnall & Partners in 1967, the project included a series of city blocks inspired by the redevelopment of vacant downtowns in Europe and new cities in America, and included a significant commercial component. The plan was abandoned in 1968 due to conflicting local and state interests and the lack of acceptable supply.
The following year, the Treasury Department initiated a formal investigation into a suitable site for an art gallery, led by Treasurer, Deputy Premier and Liberal Party Leader, Gordon Chalk. An expert committee, including Coordinator-General Charles Barton as chair, Under-Secretary of Works David Mercer and Assistant Under-Secretary Roman Pavlyshyn, considered 12 sites, including those from previous proposals. Three sites were shortlisted:
The Holy Name Cathedral site in Fortitude Valley Upstream of the Victoria Bridge at South Brisbane The BCC Transport Depot in Coronation Drive
The South Brisbane site was preferred as it was considered the most advantageous to the city and the most architecturally appropriate. The recommendation was accepted and work began on a design.
In 1972, the Queensland Government decided to build a new Queensland Art Gallery as part of the project.History of the Queensland Art Gallery Later, during 1974, the government decided to build a comprehensive Queensland Cultural Centre that would include the Queensland Performing Arts Centre, the State Library of Queensland, the Queensland Museum, and the Queensland Art Gallery, so that all of these facilities would be in close proximity to each other and would also be easily accessible to Brisbane central business district.
Architectural competition and concept
In April 1973, Robin Gibson and Partners Architects won a two-stage competition to design the new Queensland Art Gallery in South Brisbane with a sophisticated design that was considered superior in its simplicity and presentation. While this design was never realised, the art gallery built as part of the cultural centre was very similar in many ways, including the material palette and modernist design details inspired by the Oakland Museum in California in 1969. The original design occupied the block bounded by Melbourne, Grey, Stanley and Peel Streets. Over Stanley Street, a pedestrian walkway connected the gallery to the top of an amphitheatre leading to sculpture gardens along the river.