Dale Harding working on his commission onsite at the Queensland Art Gallery

Dale Harding discusses his incredible year

Dale Harding graduated from the Queensland College of Art in 2014, yet his opportunities and achievements since speak to a much longer practice, indeed a ‘cultural continuum’ to which he is connected through country. His artwork includes wall murals, sculpture and installations which are an exploration of the political histories and presence of his family…

Australian art, Fiona Foley, Australia b.1964, Badtjala woman 1994

We use art to question what we know

Telling the Story of Australian Art in new and innovative ways Swedish-born artist Oscar Friström’s Duramboi 1893 depicts James Davis, a young convict sent from Scotland to Australia. Davis escaped from a Moreton Bay penal colony in 1829 and lived with several Indigenous groups in the area, particularly on Fraser Island (where he was known as…

Larrtjanga Ganambarr, Australia b.c.1932-2000 / Balirlira and the Macassans c.1958

From this island, we look out across the sea

‏Telling the Story of Australian Art Your reimagined Australian Collection brings together art from different times and across cultures. After 120 years of building the Collection, there are many stories to tell of traversal and encounter, we focus on this theme as we continue with our series on Australian art. Scottish-born artist Ian Fairweather’s Lights, Darwin Harbour…

Sidney Nolan, Australia/England 1917-1992 / Mrs Fraser 1966

Sidney Nolan’s Mrs Fraser is a spectacular colonial narrative

Sidney Nolan’s painting Mrs Fraser is a captivating story. In 1947 Nolan spent an extended period in Queensland, including several weeks in Brisbane and on Fraser Island (formerly known as Great Sandy Island). In Brisbane’s John Oxley Library he read, among other things, accounts of the shipwreck of the English brig, the Stirling Castle, off…

Auschar Chauncy, England/Australia b.c.1836-1877 / Portrait of Richard Edwards 1874

We all call Queensland home

By telling the story of Australian Art, we can observe the changing nature of portraiture — the shift from democratic modes such as the nineteenth-century photograph, to oil paintings produced after a number of sittings and preparatory sketches. These portraits tell stories of contact between cultures, including colonial and immigrant experiences. Many of these stories connect…