Our region’s galleries and museums are doing spectacular things. Congratulations to all on the swathe of nominations in the Museums & Galleries NSW IMAGinE Awards.
The IMAGinE Awards celebrate the resilience, innovation, and creativity of museums, galleries and Aboriginal cultural centres across NSW. The awards are presented in Sydney on 26 November.
Bathurst Regional Art Gallery picked up nominations in the exhibition projects and engagement program categories (Galleries – Small and Volunteer – 5 or less paid staff) for the hugely important 2024 exhibition Dhuluny: the war that never ended. Bathurst-based Wiradyuri and Kamilaroi artist Jonathan Jones was also nominated for the For the ACHAA Award for Excellence by an Aboriginal Curator for both this exhibition and bagan bariwariganyan: echoes of country (at Bundanon).
Orange Regional Gallery is nominated in the exhibition projects category (Galleries- Medium – 6 or more paid staff) for the beautiful Conversations with Clarice Beckett project and exhibition in which 8 local artists from across the Central West were invited to visit the National Gallery of Australia to study Clarice Beckett’s paintings. Shown alongside Clarice Beckett: Paintings from the Collection, this project asked the artists to respond to an element of Beckett’s work or life and reimagine it in their own work.
Mudgee Arts Precinct picks up a well deserved nomination in the engagement program category
(Medium Organisations – 5 – 10 paid staff) for Tell Your Story, a new annual youth-led art exhibition showcasing the creative voices of young people from across the Mid-Western Region.
Orange Regional Museum is represented by three nominations, for both ASSEMBLE: Orange Festival of Arts 1965-1987 and for Orange 412: A history of our local Fire Brigade (in the exhibitions projects category) and for the inaugural program History Futures in the ‘engagement programs’ category. History Futures was a day for history students in Year 9 to Year 12. It included a panel of speakers, workshops and tours.’
IMAGE: Wirribee Leanna Carr with Henry Simmons, 2024, Red cedar clerk’s desk from the Museum Collection of Bathurst District Historical Society. Commissioned by Bathurst Regional Art Gallery. Courtesy the artist and Wiradyuri Traditional Owners Central West Aboriginal Corporation.