Every year, around the world, we celebrate International Museum Day on 18 May.

The theme for 2020 is Museums for Equality: Diversity and Inclusion and museums are being asked to think about who is represented in our collections, and of museums as cultural hubs and the future of tradition. We look at how our current collections represent the past, and what our future collections might say about today.

One of the iconic objects in the State History Collection held by the History Trust of South Australia is the plan of Adelaide, drawn to the instructions of Colonel William Light.

Light’s Plan of Adelaide, 1837, HT 2001.0166

The plan shows how British arrivals literally mapped out their future in this ancient land, and heralded major changes for the Kaurna people, and Aboriginal people across our state. The British arrivals forever altered the land we now know as Adelaide, and South Australia. Who does this plan represent? Who was left out of this founding plan for our city?

As we build our museum collections into the future what will be the iconic objects we collect, and who will they represent?