In 2023 Bundanon celebrates its 30th anniversary. Established in 1993, it was gifted to the Australian people by Arthur and Yvonne Boyd, representing one of the most significant acts of philanthropy in the history of the arts in Australia. In recognition of this thirty-year milestone, Bundanon today announced the new exhibition season Fantastic Forms. Curated by Boe-Lin Bastian and Sophie O’Brien, Fantastic Forms opens at the new Art Museum on Saturday 1 April 2023. Colourful, abundant and joyful, it celebrates the ritual of artmaking and its connection to everyday life through ceramics, sculpture and animation.

Honouring the Boyd family legacy, Fantastic Forms brings new commissions by three contemporary Australian artists, Nabilah Nordin, Stephen Benwell and Rubyrose Bancroft, into conversation with Bundanon’s expansive collection of drawings by artist William Merric Boyd (1888 –1959), Arthur Boyd’s father.

Ngununggula, the Southern Highlands’ first regional art gallery, has announced its ambitious program for 2023, and unveiled the gallery’s inaugural outdoor sculpture commission, Scholar Rock Portals, by emerging Australian artist Louise Zhang.

The second annual visual arts program since its opening in September 2021, the dynamic 2023 program features newly commissioned works and major collaborative group exhibitions by leading Australian artists and collectives, including Iltja Ntjarra Many Hands Art Centre, proppaNOW, Tom Polo, Tony Albert, Kate Blackmore, Karen Black, Jude Rae, Nadia Hernandez, and Noel McKenna, alongside the return of the highly anticipated Midwinter Festival. Representing the Southern Highlands region and beyond, the 2023 program reflects Ngununggula’s ongoing commitment to creating engaging ways for the local community to connect with artists and their ideas.

Image: Nadia Hernández, Varios personajes, 2022, oil and synthetic polymer paint, flashe, cotton, rope, ribbon, recycled timber, 150.0 x 190.0 x 180.0 cm, Courtesy of the artist and STATION. Photo: Christo Crocker

A major outdoor public artwork by leading First Nations multidisciplinary artist Brenda L. Croft (Gurindji/Malngin/Mudburra) has been unveiled along the Barangaroo waterfront. The landmark installation, titled Naabami (thou shall/will see): Barangaroo (army of me) presents 60 large-scale photographic portraits of contemporary First Nations women and girls.

Photographed in Canberra and Sydney from 2019 – 2022, some of the participants include women and girls photographed by Croft spanning three decades, and some are first-time subjects. Several generations of families are portrayed; some participants were first photographed as children, now represented as steadfast young women; sisters, aunties, mothers, grandmothers. Cultural affiliations range from the southeast to the northern regions of the continent. Contemporary First Nations sovereign warriors grounded in their First Nations sovereignty. Their steady collective gaze – inward and outward – reflects the steadfast sovereign actions of Cammeraygal warrior woman Barangaroo, more than two centuries after she lived and died on her traditional homelands, now known as Sydney.

This major project commissioned by Lendlease, is presented as part of Sydney Festival 2023, and will be on display until 29 January.

Two major exhibitions by leading Australian artists, The Huxleys and Paul Yore, have opened at Carriageworks as part of Sydney Festival and Sydney WorldPride. The Huxleys’ largest exhibition to date, Bloodlines honours the legacy of legendary queer artists lost to HIV/AIDS whilst Paul Yore’s immersive installation, WORD MADE FLESH, imagines a queer alternative reality.

On display until 5 March, Bloodlines is a heartfelt tribute to LGBTQIA+ artists, including Leigh Bowery, Robert Mapplethorpe, Keith Haring and Sylvester, that continue to inspire the practices of The Huxleys and countless artists working today. Utilising the artists’ skills in costume design, performance and photography, the exhibition features large-scale photographic works and video art.

In partnership with the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA), Carriageworks presents Paul Yore: WORD MADE FLESH, a major immersive architecturally-scaled installation. Originally commissioned by ACCA, the work comes to Sydney after its premiere in Melbourne last year, and is composed of makeshift structures, mixed media sculpture, found objects, collage and assemblage, paintings, video and pulsating sound and light. Conceived as a cacophonous and kaleidoscopic ‘gesamtkunstwerk,’ WORD MADE FLESH imagines a queer alternative reality, erected from the wasteland of the Anthropocene on display until 26 February.