Former Art Gallery of Ballarat Director Gordon Morrison will visit Ararat Gallery TAMA on Tuesday 19th February 2019 at 2pm to present a floor talk about our current exhibition Animalia Australis, and we’d love you to join us.
During this informal talk, Gordon, the curator of this exhibition, will tell some of the stories behind the images, including the first kangaroo that was kept in England and an emu that was displayed at the Tower of London in the 1820s.
The Art Gallery of Ballarat started collecting works in this field after their Capturing Floraexhibition in 2013. The first time Animalia Australis was exhibited was in Cairns two years ago, before Ballarat from April to June last year. It formed part of the Art Gallery of Ballarat’s brief to comprehensively collect the arts of Australian natural history as part of its holdings of 18th and 19th century Australian art or art with Australian subject matter.
RSVPs appreciated, group bookings advised – please call us on 5355 0220.
To compliment the Going Round in Squares exhibition opening at Ararat Gallery TAMA, Sera Waters will conduct a workshop on the basics of blackwork embroidery, a counted thread technique, and how it can be used contemporarily.
Materials supplied, BYO small hoop. This workshop is limited to 12 people – phone the Gallery on 5355 0220 to book. Cost – $60/$55 TAMA members.
Ararat Gallery TAMA is excited to announce textile artist Sera Waters’ Going Round in Squares will open on March 9 and be on show until June 30. As part of this exhibition, Sera will also present a blackwork embroidery workshop, see below for details.
The official opening of this exhibition will be at 2pm on Saturday March 9 – all welcome.
The artworks of Going Round in Squares explore ideas around the grids and boundary lines which have governed life in Australia since colonisation. Roads, fence lines, walls, furniture and even social boundaries, reinforce ways of being that Sera has come to call a “geometric discipline”. Textile practice especially, performed atop the gridded warp and weft of fabric, is a form of discipline that has historically shaped women’s lives, their education and opportunities. As women have traditionally been the makers of homes, Sera’s artworks re-work textile traditions to explore the disciplining roles of neatness, order, pattern, binding and containment, all ideas associated with the domestic.
Mini Makers Art Club is designed especially for pre-schoolers with a craft theme inspired by a different story book each month. Each session includes, sing-a-longs, a story reading and guided craft activities designed to develop creative expression and fine motor skills in a fun, inclusive and encouraging environment. At the end of each session your child will have produced a lovely piece of art to take home. The theme for February is ‘Dreamy Dream Catchers’.
Mini Makers Art Club is designed especially for pre-schoolers with a craft theme inspired by a different story book each month. Each session includes, sing-a-longs, a story reading and guided craft activities designed to develop creative expression and fine motor skills in a fun, inclusive and encouraging environment. At the end of each session your child will have produced a lovely piece of art to take home. The theme for February is ‘Dreamy Dream Catchers’.
Feeling creative over the summer break? Drop into the gallery during the school holidays and join in our free wildlife art project… ‘WILD THINGS’ .
You can make a range of Aussie bush creatures from supplied craft materials and add them to a beautiful Grampians-inspired landscape. mural, bringing it to life!
Year 10 and VCE students from Marian College Ararat collaborated with artist Bev Isaac (a founding member of the WAMA artist group), to create the mural in response to our current exhibition ‘Animalia Australis’.
The mural is exhibited in the Ararat Gallery foyer and visitors of all ages are invited to come along and contribute to its evolution.
* Please note: This is a self-guided, drop-in activity & all children must be accompanied and supervised by an adult.
Presented in collaboration with WAMA (Wildlife Arts Museum Australia).
Artists from the WAMA (Wildlife Art Museum Australia) artist group are hosting a weekend of art activities at Ararat Gallery TAMA!
Pop in to the gallery, view the ‘Animalia Australis’ exhibition for inspiration then visit us in the TAMA studio where you can have fun creating beautiful Australian bush creatures from an exciting range of natural materials, found objects and clay.
FREE Admission. Art Smocks recommended if you want to play with the clay!
Children must be accompanied and supervised by an adult.
Please join us for our 50th Birthday Party and opening celebration of our two permanent collection exhibitions, Fifty: Celebrating 50 Years of Collecting Fibre Art and Testament: Robert Salzer Foundation Acquisitions.
The half century milestone of the Ararat Gallery provides a moment to reflect on the importance of the TAMA collection. An extraordinary repository that tracks the development of textile and fibre based practice from the early 1970s through to today; a legacy elevating the TAMA collection to one of the most significant of its kind in Australia.
We will celebrate with fine fare, fine wine, music, a special birthday cake inspired by the permanent collection, guest speakers and of course all our wonderful gallery supporters and friends.
FREE ART BUSES have been chartered from Ballarat and Natimuk/Horsham so the greater region can join Ararat Gallery TAMA in celebrating its 50th birthday. Locals are encouraged to tell their associates from these regions about the buses and to attend the opening of fifty with their friends and family. Tickets include a glass of complimentary champagne. Limited seats available. BOOK NOW by emailing: kpengelly@ararat.vic.gov.au
Celebration to be held in the Town Hall foyer – entrance via Barkly Street. Free Entry
The exhibition reveals the dynamic uptake of textiles in Australia’s contemporary art practise. Building on the gallery’s comprehensive collection of post-minimalist and craft-based textile fibre art from the 1970s and 1980s, these more recent purchases showcase new and unexpected approaches to the use of textiles as part of challenging the hierarchy of materials by contemporary artists.
Since its inception in 2005, the Robert Salzer Foundation has committed substantial funding each year to the Public Galleries Association of Victoria (PGAV) in order to enable eligible Victorian galleries to purchase works of art for their permanent collections. This unique fund plays a vital role in empowering galleries to acquire key works of visual art for the benefit of their audiences and communities.
Robert (Bob) Salzer was born in Vienna in 1924. He was brought up in the rich tradition of Viennese culture that treasures the arts. Migrating to Melbourne in 1961 with his wife Betty; Bob made his fortune in the commercial Melbourne building industry over three decades. The Robert Salzer Foundation represents a profound devotion to the arts, which was integral to Bob and Betty’s life work.
Permanent collections remain the lifeblood of public galleries and play a pivotal role in promoting a distinctive identity in a crowded cultural marketplace. Ararat Gallery TAMA’s collection influences and informs our annual program. Many new areas of research and programming opportunities have developed in tandem with acquisitions that stimulate new ideas, build relationships with artists and provide enormous potential for audience engagement and development.
Ararat Gallery TAMA extends its sincere thanks to the Robert Salzer Foundation for its dedication to and support of the public gallery sector in Victoria.