Elizabeth Ann Macgregor OBE opened her Newington College Ethics Centre lecture on ‘Why do we need the Arts?’ citing her credentials as a bus driver. Prior to moving to Australia and holding a 15 year tenure as the Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Liz Ann curated and drove the Scottish Arts Council’s travelling gallery in the 1980s.

“Running a bus as a gallery is like when the circus comes to town,” she says reflecting back. “If you are respectful of people you will find them more likely to be open to the ideas of contemporary art”. Liz Ann believes that the power of contemporary art resides in its capacity to change the way people think about the world around them, and like a bus, can transport audiences to a different time, place, and frame of mind.

However, rather than housing art in avant garde, austere surroundings and using language that excludes people, galleries and museums need to make their artists approachable and the art accessible, Liz Ann says,“We need to ensure people do not feel alienated. We need actual encounters with artists”.

Throughout Liz Ann’s career she has worked towards increasing the social impact of art. She has worked with Scotland’s Council Schools, and with remote Indigenous communities to show how it can change lives. “Why is it that art can open up a conversation with a group of difficult children?” Liz Ann asks. “Because children can be open to ideas that are challenging if inspired by the possibility of different ideas.”

The MCA’s programs for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities are modern reincarnations of Liz Ann’s travelling gallery. It proves the power of art to transcend geographical and cultural boundaries. In addition, the MCA also commisions for works to be made for audiences with visual impairment and intellectual disabilities.“These are stimulating, fun and include an invitation to contribute” she says. “Interactive performance as well as laughter are very much part of the vehicles for learning in our Museum.”

Currently, the MCA hosts public program events for the Smith Family ‘Momentum’- to bring isolated children from remote New South Wales to the MCA for residency as artists – and ‘Generation Next’ – a youth event which excludes entry of parents or teachers. Such initiatives remove the traditional bias as to ‘who’ has access to the Museum and makes it a dynamic place for everyone. ‘Generation Next’ for example now finds the ‘teenage only’ attendees in excess of 500 on a Sunday evening compared to the 100, once predicted.

So, how do artists add value to society?

“Because art is about process and engagement, an artist can see a situation and create visual communication, or draw attention to an issue. The added value I see, is a future where artists address some of the biggest problems we are facing.

“Creativity is being increasingly recognised as bringing innovation and new ideas. It is not an optional extra and art is the gymnasium for the mind. Art gives us tolerance and new understandings of complexity,” she said.

When asked, “What is valuable art?”, Liz Ann drew a significant distinction between the decisions of the MCA and other museums’ acquisitions. “There is a concept of ‘market value’ in art, and I can’t tell you all about that – museums are full of storerooms where curators got it wrong. But then, there is a completely different value in art – we can ask ‘can art make a social impact?’ At the MCA, our answer is, ‘we certainly hope so!’