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Michael Robinson is coming home. The Vancouver-born former chief executive officer and president of Calgary's Glenbow Museum starts his new job as executive director of the Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art Jan. 1, just before his 58th birthday. It's a move he describes as “somewhat salmonoid.”

His connection with Northwest Coast art began at the University of British Columbia, where he studied anthropology. Saturday mornings were spent visiting the carving sheds and chatting with Reid and others; vacation time meant month-long kayaking trips through Haida Gwaii with his wife. His gold wedding band is an aboriginal design.

“I had a desire to complete the circle, to move my family back to the coast, where we all started out,” he explains. “I'm not here to spawn and die, though,” he laughs, sprawled across a jade-coloured leather arm chair in the gallery's main hall.

That would certainly be a waste: His hiring is something of a coup for the cultural life of Vancouver. Apart from his eight-year tenure at the Glenbow, Robinson is a member of the Order of Canada and a Rhodes Scholar, and he spent his early career working extensively in the north of the country on the social and environmental regulation of energy projects.

At Glenbow, he managed an annual budget of $12-million and a staff of 150; at the Bill Reid Gallery, he has $600,000 and 12 staff. What marks Glenbow out, he says, is its private funding structure, co-management with the Blackfoot nation and wider cultural partnerships. “I began to realize – as the economy went south this year – that there were more opportunities to take the Glenbow operating model and its attention to the bottom line, and apply it elsewhere.”

Though the Vancouver operation is on a much smaller scale than he is used to, it is not necessarily going to be problem-free: The gallery opened in May, but has yet to establish itself in the city's cultural life. Although it is downtown, the building is rather awkward to find, with an entrance off a courtyard that sits above street level. Inside, it needs better climate control and security, improvements in lighting and display cabinetry, and a reworking of the gallery space.

He likes a challenge, he says, noting that this is also the first time he has been responsible for a start-up project. He is trying to get ahead: Even though he has not officially taken charge, he already has a clear plan for the museum. First, he says, Canadians need to understand how important an artist Reid is on the international scene – and how his legacy is vital to an understanding of what this country is about.

“The roots of Canada are in nature,” he argues. “They are in first nation cultures – much more than they are in condominia, in the urban environment. And you have to study Bill Reid and the artists that follow to understand that.”

To generate that interest, and offer greater understanding, he wants to make the museum a space for conversation. “I think we are ideally suited to host dialogue on topics that bring first nations and the general public together,” he explains. “There is every need for people to better understand the comprehensive claim and the treaty negotiations, every need for them to understand the historic roots, and a pressing need for them to understand first nation perspectives on stewardship.”

There will be strong links developed with the Haida Heritage Centre in Kaay Linagaay (where Robinson will continue to work as a consultant, as he did for much of last year). These will be formalized through the incipient Bill Reid Teaching Centre. He also wants to make connections with other Vancouver arts organizations.

“It always strikes me as ironic that Calgary can create a cultural district and Vancouver struggles,” he says.

The comment isn't the only sign that there is an edge beneath Robinson's otherwise gregarious charm. When issues with the museum's building come up, he starts ranting about the vagaries of “starchitecture.” Discussion of potential competition with UBC's extensive Museum of Anthropology provokes a long response about how much more freedom a non-affiliated non-governmental organization (like Glenbow and the Bill Reid Gallery) has by comparison. He even suggests that the affiliation with Kaay Linagaay will make the smaller gallery “the first port of call by students and academics interested in working more closely with Haida Gwaii.”

He also has an unsettling habit of referring to himself in the third person: He talks about “the career of Mike,” how it's “very Robinson to cultivate partnerships” and how this job is a “good role for Mike Robinson to play.”

If it suggests there is an ego at play, it is hardly a surprise. Last March, he had the chutzpah to stand as a Liberal candidate – in Alberta. If the provincial party had done as well as predicted, he would be an MLA now. Instead, he took 5,000 votes against the Conservative incumbent's 6,000, and was forced to reassess.

“Ha!” he snorts good-naturedly. “The cards didn't stack in exactly the way I would have liked.”

He took a friend's advice and slunk off to his “beautiful new house” in Saltery Bay on British Columbia's northern Sunshine Coast. “They told me to go into my cave and lick my wounds for a month and when I came out, I'd feel whole and happy and have decided a new course for my life.

“And that's just what I did.”