Art Gallery of Ballarat is the oldest and largest regional
art galleryAn art gallery or art museum is a building or space for the exhibition of art, usually visual art.Museums can be public or private, but what distinguishes a museum is the ownership of a collection...
in
AustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. Established in 1884 as the
Ballarat Fine Art Gallery by the citizens of
BallaratBallarat is a city in the state of Victoria, Australia, approximately west-north-west of the state capital Melbourne situated on the lower plains of the Great Dividing Range and the Yarrowee River catchment. It is the largest inland centre and third most populous city in the state and the fifth...
both the building and part of its collection is listed on the
Victorian Heritage RegisterThe Victorian Heritage Register lists places of cultural heritage significance to the State of Victoria, Australia. It has statutory weight under the Heritage Act 1995 which establishes Heritage Victoria as the permit authority...
and by the National Trust of Victoria.
The gallery is notable as the home, since 1895, of the original
Eureka FlagThe Eureka Flag is a design; a dark blue field with a central white symmetric cross consisting five eight-pointed stars, representing the Crux constellation....
and houses major collections covering the history of Australian art from the early colonial period to the present day.
For the first five years of the Gallery's life, the Association rented the large Supper Room of the Ballarat Academy of Music, now Her Majesty's Theatre,, which was made available by
Sir William Clarke, 1st BaronetSir William John Clarke, 1st Baronet was an Australian landowner.He was born on 31 March 1831 at Lovely Banks, Van Diemen's Land, the eldest of three sons of William John Turner Clarke, and his wife Eliza, née Dowling....
. The Association then worked to secure land on the site of the Government Camp and to raise funds for a permanent home for its collection. Much of the energy and the money came from prominent Ballarat citizen, James Oddie. The current building is the oldest purpose built art gallery building in Australia.
Designed by Tappin, Gilbert and Dennehy in the Renaissance Revival architecture style as a
bluestoneBluestone is a cultural or commercial name for a number of dimension or building stone varieties, including:*a feldspathic sandstone in the U.S. and Canada;*limestone in the Shenandoah Valley in the U.S...
brick and render facade and stone stairway, the foundation stone was laid in 1887 to commemorate Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee.
The Gallery is a not-for-profit company limited by guarantee, of which the City of Ballarat is the sole shareholder. It is administered by a Board of Directors. Gordon Morrison has been Director of the Gallery since 2004.
The Gallery is supported by the Art Gallery of Ballarat Foundation , which raises funds and receives donations on behalf of the Gallery and by the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery Association, an independent incorporated association which established the Gallery in 1884 and gave it to Ballaarat City Council in 1972. Membership of the Association is open to members of the public and brings with it a range of benefits, including discounts at the Gallery Shop and cafe and invitations to exhibition openings.
Redevelopment and restoration
A 2001 public appeal raised $2 million for expansion of the gallery. The $7 million extension by H Troon and designed by
Peddle ThorpPeddle Thorp is an architecture firm based in Melbourne that has designed many of Australia's landmark buildings. Among the buildings it has designed include: the Melbourne Aquarium, Vodafone Arena; Rod Laver Arena; Skilled Stadium; and ANZ Headquarters...
was finally completed in 2001 to accommodate the expanding collection of contemporary works, temporary exhibits and gallery functions. In addition cast iron street gazebos based on the original were reconstructed and reinstated.
Entry to the Gallery is free, with entry fees applying only to selected special exhibitions.
A $1.85 million exterior restoration project began in 2009 and completed in 2010 which resulted in the reversal of unsympathetic 1950s renovations including paint being removed from the facade and reopening of the windows.
Collection
The collection includes works from:
Fred WilliamsFrederick Ronald Williams OBE was an Australian painter and printmaker. He was one of Australia’s most important artists, and one of the twentieth century’s major painters of the landscape...
,
Sidney NolanSir Sidney Robert Nolan OM, AC was one of Australia's best-known painters and printmakers.-Early life:Nolan was born in Carlton, a suburb of Melbourne, on 22 April 1917. He was the eldest of four children. His family later moved to St Kilda. Nolan attended the Brighton Road State School and...
,
Clarice BeckettClarice Majoribanks Beckett was an Australian painter born in Casterton, Victoria. Her works are featured in the collections of the National Gallery of Australia, National Gallery of Victoria and the Art Gallery of South Australia....
,
Arthur BoydArthur Merric Bloomfield Boyd, AC, OBE was one of the leading Australian painters of the late 20th Century. A member of the prominent Boyd artistic dynasty in Australia, his relatives included painters, sculptors, architects or other arts professionals. His sister Mary Boyd married John Perceval,...
,
Rupert BunnyRupert Charles Wulsten Bunny was an Australian painter, born in St Kilda, Victoria. He achieved success and critical acclaim as an expatriate in fin-de-siècle Paris....
,
William DobellSir William Dobell, OBE was an Australian artist .The electoral Division of Dobell is named after him.- Life :...
,
Russell DrysdaleSir George Russell Drysdale, AC was an Australian artist. He won the prestigious Wynne Prize for Sofala in 1947, and represented Australia at the Venice Biennale in 1954...
,
Rick AmorRick Amor is an Australian artist and figurative painter. He was an official war artist.-Life and work:Rick Amor was born in Frankston, Victoria, Australia. He has a certificate in art from the Caulfield Institute of Technology, and Associate Diploma in Painting from the National Gallery School,...
, Heinrich Bűrkel,
Louis BuvelotLouis Buvelot , born Abram-Louis Buvelot, was a Swiss-born landscape painter who emigrated to Australia in 1865 and influenced the Heidelberg School of painters.-Early life:...
,
William BarakWilliam Barak , was the last traditional ngurungaeta of the Wurundjeri-willam clan, based around the area of present-day Melbourne, Australia...
,
Charles ConderCharles Edward Conder was an English-born painter, lithographer and designer. He emigrated to Australia and was a key figure in the Heidelberg School, arguably the beginning of a distinctively Australian tradition in Western art.-Early life:Conder was born in Tottenham, Middlesex, the second son,...
, Thomas Flintoff, S T Gill
John GloverJohn Glover was an English/Australian artist in what is known as the early colonial period of Australian art. In Australia he has been dubbed the father of Australian landscape painting.-Life in Europe:...
,
Joy HesterJoy St Clair Hester was an Australian artist who played an important, though sometimes underrated, role in the development of Australian modernism, though her works could also be considered Abstract Expressionism....
,
Hans HeysenSir Hans Heysen, OBE was a well-known German Australian artist. He was particularly recognized for his watercolours of the Australian bush. He won the Wynne Prize for landscape painting a record nine times.-Biography:...
,
Nora HeysenNora Heysen AM was an Australian artist, the first woman to win the prestigious Archibald Prize for portraiture and the first Australian woman appointed as an official war artist.-Biography:...
,
Norman LindsayNorman Alfred William Lindsay was an Australian artist, sculptor, writer, editorial cartoonist, scale modeler, and boxer. He was born in Creswick, Victoria....
,
Howard ArkleyHoward Arkley was an Australian artist, born in Melbourne, known for his airbrushed paintings of houses, architecture and suburbia. His mothers side of the family was Jewish and his father was German...
,
E. Phillips Fox- Education :Fox was born on 12 March 1865 to Alexander Fox and Rosetta Phillips at 12 Victoria Parade in Fitzroy, Melbourne, into a legal family whose firm, DLA Phillips Fox, still exists. He studied art at the National Gallery School in Melbourne from 1878 until 1886 under G. F...
,
Robert JacksRobert Jacks is an Australian painter, sculptor and printmaker.Born in Melbourne, Australia. He studied sculpture from 1958 to 1960 at the Prahran Technical College, Melbourne, and painting in 1961 and 1962 at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology .In 1966 he had his first solo exhibition at...
, George Johnson,
Frederick McCubbinFrederick McCubbin was an Australian painter who was prominent in the Heidelberg School, one of the more important periods in Australia's visual arts history....
,
Tom RobertsThomas William Roberts , usually known simply as Tom, was a prominent Australian artist and a key member of the Heidelberg School.-Life:...
,
Arthur StreetonSir Arthur Ernest Streeton was an Australian landscape painter.-Early life:Streeton was born in Mount Duneed, near Geelong, and his family moved to Richmond in 1874. In 1882, Streeton commenced art studies with G. F. Folingsby at the National Gallery School.Streeton was influenced by French...
,
William BarakWilliam Barak , was the last traditional ngurungaeta of the Wurundjeri-willam clan, based around the area of present-day Melbourne, Australia...
,
George BellGeorge Frederick Henry Bell was an Australian painter.He was born in Kew, Victoria, the son of George Bell, a public servant, and educated at Kew High School. He studied at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School from 1895-1903...
, William Henry Bartlett (1858-1932),
Charles BlackmanCharles Blackman is one of the best known Australian artists still living today, especially for the famous Schoolgirl and Alice in Wonderland series of the 1950s...
,
Merric BoydWilliam Merric Boyd was an Australian artist active as a ceramicist, painter, and sculptor.Merric Boyd is credited as the father of studio pottery in Australia; he is also known for his drawing, painting and sculpting...
,
Michael KmitMichael Kmit was a Ukrainian painter who spent twenty-five of his most productive years in Australia. He is notable for introducing a neo-Byzantine style of painting to Australia, and winning a number of major Australian art prizes including the Blake Prize and the Sulman Prize...
,
Arthur BoydArthur Merric Bloomfield Boyd, AC, OBE was one of the leading Australian painters of the late 20th Century. A member of the prominent Boyd artistic dynasty in Australia, his relatives included painters, sculptors, architects or other arts professionals. His sister Mary Boyd married John Perceval,...
,
John BrackJohn Brack was an Australian painter, and a member of the Antipodeans group.-Life:...
,
Charles ConderCharles Edward Conder was an English-born painter, lithographer and designer. He emigrated to Australia and was a key figure in the Heidelberg School, arguably the beginning of a distinctively Australian tradition in Western art.-Early life:Conder was born in Tottenham, Middlesex, the second son,...
,
Nicholas ChevalierNicholas Chevalier was an Australian artist.-Early life:Chevalier was born in St Petersburg, Russia, the son of Louis Chevalier, who came from Vaud, Switzerland, and was overseer to the estates of the Prince de Wittgenstein in Russia. Nicholas' mother was Russian...
,
David Davies (artist)David Davies was an Australian artist associated with the Heidelberg School, the first significant Western art movement in Australia.Davies was born in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia....
,
Janet DawsonJanet Dawson is an Australian artist who won the Archibald Prize in 1973 with a portrait of Michael Boddy.She studied at the Gallery School in Melbourne from 1952 to 1956. She was then awarded a Travelling Scholarship to London and went with another scholarship to Italy, later to Paris, returning...
,
Robert Hawker DowlingRobert Hawker Dowling was an Australian colonial artist.Dowling was born in England the youngest son of Rev. Henry Dowling and his wife Elizabeth, née Darke. He was brought to Launceston, Tasmania with his parents in 1839 in the Janet. He received lessons from Thomas Bock and Frederick Strange,...
and
Eugene von GuerardJohann Joseph Eugene von GuérardHis first name is variously spelled "Eugen", "Eugene", "Eugène", one source mentions "Jean" ; his surname is spelled "Guerard" or "Guérard". The most frequent combination is that used by the National Gallery of Australia: "Eugene von Guérard"...
.
Gallery of selected works
Note that other notable works are in the collection but the following examples are ones in the public domain and for which pictures are available.