Minister John Graham told to resign over Parramatta Powerhouse crisis

The founding director of the Powerhouse Museum has called on NSW Arts Minister John Graham to fall on his sword amid the “cataclysm” at the Parramatta Powerhouse that has seen chief executive Lisa Havilah step aside under a cloud of controversy just 10 weeks out from the $915m project’s opening.

Ms Havilah’s shock move comes just days before she was to be questioned at a NSW budget estimates committee hearing amid broader concerns over budget blowouts and investigations into complaints about governance. Powerhouse chief operating officer Mark Wilsdon was replaced last month by Treasury executive Cassandra Wilkinson against the backdrop of departmental scrutiny of the institution’s operating costs.

Lindsay Sharp led the creation of the Powerhouse and served as director of the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences from 1978-88 before taking the helm of London’s prestigious National Museum of Science and Industry. He said he had never witnessed a cultural institution suffer such a rupture so close to the opening of a major project.

“I’ve run museums and been a senior consultant for about six different jurisdictions and I’ve never come across anything like this,” Dr Sharp told The Australian. “It’s cataclysmic, in terms of bureaucracy and project management. If anyone in government, a senior person in government, has to step down, it is Minister Graham.

“He said, categorically, ‘I’m going to be very different from the previous government – I’m going to be transparent’ and so on and so forth. Well, I think he’s done exactly the opposite, with respect to freedom of information, and answers at budget estimates about the Powerhouse. He should fall on his sword.”

Ms Havilah, Powerhouse CEO since 2019 and who reports to Mr Graham, on Thursday stood aside pending an investigation into fresh allegations levelled at her regarding “governance and procurement practices”. The allegations are understood to be separate to those at the centre of an ongoing investigation into a whistleblower complaint lodged last year about hiring and procurement.

NSW Government Architect Abbie Galvin was appointed interim chief executive, while former Sydney Opera House chief executive Louise Herron was installed as “strategic adviser”. Ms Havilah was contacted for comment on the decision to stand aside.

Dr Sharp said the timing of Ms Havilah’s stepping aside – a matter of weeks out from opening – was notable.

“This would tend to suggest that whatever it is that has caused this disruption, or rupture in the space-time fabric of culture in NSW, is very serious,” he said.

Mr Graham’s office refused to comment further on the nature of the rift. Mr Graham is due to appear before budget estimates on Monday.

Dr Sharp has been a longstanding critic of the decision to move the Powerhouse from Ultimo to Parramatta. In submissions to NSW parliamentary inquiries, he has warned that the relocation was poorly planned and inadequately costed.

Ms Havilah’s decision on Thursday to stand aside has thrown the institution’s grand opening and its future into turmoil as it races toward the November 7 deadline. The 33,000sqm two-building institution, marked by a white exoskeleton design and dubbed the Milk Crate by its detractors, was designed by Franco-Japanese architectural firm Moreau Kusunoki with Sydney practice Genton. It has been hailed by successive governments and supporters as a grand gesture of cultural equity for western Sydney. It boasts 18,000sqm dedicated to exhibition and public space, including seven large, column-free galleries. The building has been beset by years-long delays and questions over spending and claims of de-skilling its workforce.

Ms Wilkinson last month was called in to oversee the Powerhouse’s operating budget against the backdrop of claims it had spent more than $70m ahead of its opening.

The Powerhouse also has faced close scrutiny over a film commissioned to document the Parramatta project, reportedly budgeted at $2.5m; a $2.6m “artistic associates” program that was subsequently axed, and; the $750,000 price tag of Tree of Life, a 7m-tall sculpture by Indian artist Bharti Kher that will be on display at the Parramatta site for three years.

Ms Havilah has spent seven years leading one of the largest cultural projects in Australian history: a $1.2bn overhaul of the Powerhouse’s four Sydney sites, centred on the construction of the new museum at Parramatta and taking in the redevelopment of its historic Ultimo home.

Of the government’s responsibility, prominent art critic John McDonald on his Substack site, Everything the Art World Doesn’t Want You To Know, also laid blame at the feet of the minister. “When it comes to John Graham, the responsibility is even more obvious,” he wrote. “He has defended his CEO to the media and in parliamentary committees for years. Labor was elected on a promise to fix the Powerhouse disaster and has only made matters worse – much worse. Any failure on Havilah’s part is an even greater failure on Graham’s.

“If Havilah goes down, the minister stands revealed as her chief enabler, who has refused to listen to expert advice or public petitions. At every stage the smiling Mr Graham has invested in Havilah’s ‘vision’ and should accept his share of the blame.”

Powerhouse Museum Alliance member Kylie Winkworth, a former Powerhouse Museum trustee, said crisis was engulfing the institution and it ran “far deeper than one CEO”.

“This is a profound failure of governance,” Ms Winkworth said. “This scandal runs far deeper than one CEO.”

In a statement, Mr Graham said his main priority was the nearly completed museum and its staff.

“The government’s focus is on ensuring that the opening at Parramatta lives up to the public’s expectations as western Sydney’s first cultural institution,” he said. “Right now, there are hundreds of people at the Powerhouse working hard to make sure, when the doors swing open in November, everyone can enjoy a truly great museum experience. I thank them for the incredible work.”

Ms Winkworth told The Australian last week she believed the institution and its staff base had been “comprehensively de-skilled”, with the loss of specialist expertise posing “a huge risk to conservation”.

Speaking to The Australian recently, Ms Havilah rejected the claims, saying the institution had strengthened rather than weakened its curatorial capacity and had grown its curatorial team from 20 to 32. But a submission from the Powerhouse Museum Alliance to a recent inquiry alleged the museum had broadened the meaning of “curator” to include staff without specialist museum background.

Dr Sharp also rejected the idea that the Parramatta project should be judged simply by whether its doors open successfully.

“We all want western Sydney to have something resplendent and fantastic,” he said. “Why would we not?”

But he questioned whether the new institution would function as a conventional museum, arguing the scale and design of the Parramatta complex represented a fundamental departure from the Powerhouse’s original intention. “It’s just not going to be a museum,” he said.

Ms Havilah is not without her supporters. Prominent gallery director Anna Schwartz, commenting on an ABC story about Ms Havilah stepping aside, wrote: “A more talented and honourable person than Lisa Havilah for this role could not exist.”

During a recent tour of the almost-completed building, Ms Havilah told The Australian that while she understood the strong feelings, the Parramatta project was an important one. “The Powerhouse has to move forward,” she said. “Sometimes museums have to change to stay relevant.”

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