National Gallery of Australia description and photos - Australia: Canberra (Topic)

National Gallery of Australia description and photos - Australia: Canberra. Detailed information about the attraction. Description, photographs and a map showing the nearest significant objects. The title in English is National Gallery of Australia.

Photo & Description

The National Gallery of Australia, founded in 1967, is the premier art gallery and museum in Canberra. One of the first promoters of the idea of creating a national art gallery at the beginning of the 20th century was the famous Australian artist Tom Roberts. In 1912, the Australian Parliament established the Historical Memorial Council, which decided to assemble a collection of portraits of Australian governors general, politicians and other "fathers" of the nation. Responsible for this large-scale event was the Commonwealth Art Advisory Council, which operated until 1973. The first collected collections were exhibited in the Australian Parliament building, because the Great Depression and World Wars for many years did not allow finding funds for the construction of a special building. It was only in 1965 that the decision was made to build the National Gallery, but the construction itself began only in 1973 and lasted almost 10 years. In 1982, the grand opening of the National Gallery of Australia took place in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain.

Gallery with an area of 23 thousand square meters? Built in the style of brutalism: surrounded by a sculptural garden, the building is distinguished by angular shapes and rough texture of concrete, contrasting with lush tropical greenery. Interestingly, the concrete on the outside of the building is not finished with plaster, cladding, or painting, and the internal walls have only recently been covered with boards.

The main floor houses extensive exhibition halls, which house collections dedicated to Australian aboriginal as well as European and American collections. The core of the aboriginal collection is the so-called "Aboriginal Memorial" - 200 painted logs with which the aborigines marked the graves. The memorial is dedicated to all the indigenous people who died from 1788 to 1988, defending their lands from foreigners. European and American art is represented by the works of such artists as Paul Cezanne, Claude Monet, Jackson Pollock, Andy Warhol and others. The lower floor is dedicated to the exhibition of works of Asian art (Iran, Japan, Thailand and China) from the Neolithic to the present: it contains numerous sculptures, miniatures, a collection of Chinese woodcuts, ceramics and textiles. Finally, on the top floor, you can see directly Australian art - various objects created in Australia from the time of European settlement until the 20th century. These are paintings, sculptures, interior items, photographs and much more. In total, the gallery contains over 120 thousand art objects.

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Topic: National Gallery of Australia description and photos - Australia: Canberra.