Tate Modern marks 10th birthday by expanding collection
Museum acquires new works from around the globe as part of 'ambitious' repositioning

Mark Brown, arts correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 11 May 2010 16.13 BST

Tate Modern Museum, Bankside, Millennium Bridge approach. Photograph: Dan Chung

Tate Modern has used the occasion of its 10th birthday to show how it is expanding its collection beyond Europe and North America, actively buying work from artists in countries from Algeria to Egypt to Iran.

The gallery's head of collections, Frances Morris, said it was a conscious repositioning in order "to collect the best art regardless of geography".

Acquisitions announced yesterday include 13 contemporary works by 10 artists – all new to the collection – from the Middle East and north Africa. Among them are an installation piece by Mahmoud Bakhshi Moakhar called Air Pollution of Iran 2004-06 and a scale model of an ancient north African city called Ghardaia made from cooked couscous by the French-Algerian artist Kader Attia.

Eight works have also been recently acquired from Latin America, such as Cuban Felix Gonzales-Torres's Untitled (Double Portrait); six from the Asia-Pacific region, including Korean Do Ho Suh's Staircase III; and 14 from South Africa, including Santu Mofokeng's The Black Photo Album/Look At Me.

Morris said: "The ambitious repositioning of Tate's collection is a response to the emergence of interesting and dynamic art centres across the world and an ever more complex and interconnected international art scene." She added that Tate wanted "to contribute towards a reshaping of art history reflecting local art histories across the world."

Tate is also becoming more active in photography, recently appointing a photography curator. Next week a photography acquisitions committee will be launched.

Figures released show 4,104 works have been acquired for the Tate collection as a whole since 2000, with 880 going on display at Tate Modern.

Nicholas Serota, the director of Tate, said: "Tate Modern has provided the spur for a vigorous policy at Tate of collecting more widely internationally which has deepened the collection for future generations. We are delighted to acquire these seminal works which powerfully reflect the diversity of artistic practice in the regions from which they originate."

Tate Modern this month celebrates its 10th birthday. Easily establishing itself as the most popular museum of modern art in the world, in total it has had about 45m visitors over the decade. This weekend it will host a free arts festival that will include arts events, film and music.