Past Exhibitions
Archibald Prize 2019
14 September - 5 November 2019
TarraWarra Museum of Art is the exclusive Victorian tour venue for the Archibald Prize 2019, Australia’s oldest and most prestigious art award.
TarraWarra International 2019: The Tangible Trace
8 June - 1 September 2019
The TarraWarra International 2019 exhibition, The Tangible Trace, explores the notion of a trace as a residue or marker of a place, situation or body of knowledge.
Thought Patterns: Selected Works from the Collection
23 March - 19 May 2019
Drawn from the Museum’s collection, Thought Patterns includes works by Russell Drysdale, Rosalie Gascoigne, William Delafield Cook, Louise Hearman and others.
Tracey Moffatt: Body Remembers
23 March - 19 May 2019
Tracey Moffatt: Body Remembers is the first Victorian showing of Moffatt’s photographic series Body Remembers 2017 and video work Vigil 2017 from her widely-acclaimed 57th Venice Biennale exhibition.
Katie West: Clearing
23 March - 19 May 2019
For her new solo exhibition Clearing, Katie West weaves the many threads of her practice together—natural dyeing, meditation and the creation of reading and listening spaces where the voices of Indigenous people dominate.
Patricia Piccinini & Joy Hester: Through love …
24 November 2018 - 11 March 2019
Love and intimacy are the focus of this major exhibition that pairs the work of globally renowned artist Patricia Piccinini with that of important Australian modernist Joy Hester.
TarraWarra Biennial 2018: From Will to Form
3 August - 6 November 2018
The 6th TarraWarra Biennial, From Will to Form, explores the ways human will can be expressed in physical form.
Edwin Tanner: Mathematical Expressionist
12 May - 15 July 2018
In the catalogue for his solo exhibition in 1961, Edwin Tanner (1920-1980) was described as ‘the sole member of the class “mathematical expressionists”’. It is a fitting description of an artist whose works deftly and often wittily combine his diverse range of interests and expertise, including engineering, mathematics, aeronautics and analytic philosophy, together with his […]
James Hullick: THE ARBOUR and THE ORRERY
12 May - 15 July 2018
For this exhibition, new work from James Hullick’s machine installation practice will accompany TarraWarra Museum of Art’s major survey of the work of Edwin Tanner. The exhibition will feature two new installations by Hullick that are in dialogue with the works of Tanner: THE ARBOUR OF DOORS, a speaker cave made of recycled audiovisual materials that […]
Hilarie Mais
24 February - 29 April 2018
This exhibition brings together and presents a range of key works by abstractionist Hilarie Mais made over the last decade. Hilarie Mais was born in the UK and lives and works in Sydney. Her work is characterised by a deep interest in the grid and its expressive possibilities. She makes abstract constructions and paintings that […]
Modern Currents
24 February - 29 April 2018
Featuring selected works from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection, this exhibition of abstract paintings and sculptures is timed to coincide with the Hilarie Mais exhibition. The exhibition features a group of abstract works that can be loosely grouped into geometric, pattern, colour field and conceptual abstraction. Many of the artists appeared in the landmark The Field […]
Rosemary Laing
2 December 2017 - 11 February 2018
Rosemary Laing is a renowned Australian artist who has worked with photography since the late 1980s. This exhibition includes major works that demonstrate her interest in how Australians have both perceived and moved through the landscape, shifting between dramatic vistas in works such as the leak and one dozen unnatural disasters in the Australian landscape […]
Fred Williams – 1974
2 December 2017 - 11 February 2018
In the early 1970s Williams broke with his traditional working method of painting gouaches when working outdoors. Beginning with the large scale work Lilydale Triptych I (1974), this exhibition includes several paintings from 1974, a year in which Williams’ new approaches coalesced and found full expression.
TarraWarra International: All that is solid…
2 September - 12 November 2017
All that is solid was the third exhibition in the TarraWarra International series, designed to showcase leading contemporary art practice in a global context. The Australian and international artists in this exhibition depicted precarious histories, and their art offered imaginative responses. Many of them used the format of the archival fragment as a starting point […]
Discovering Dobell
27 May - 13 August 2017
Discovering Dobell offers an intimate glimpse of William Dobell, one of Australia’s most important 20th century artists.
Dobell’s Circle
27 May - 13 August 2017
An exhibition of paintings and drawings from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection, featuring significant members of the lively community of artists William Dobell mixed with, highlighting how central he was to the mid-century Sydney scene.
Selected works from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection
27 May - 13 August 2017
A selection of works from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection.
Louise Hearman
18 February - 14 May 2017
This exhibition is the first major museum survey of Australian painter Louise Hearman, featuring painting and drawings from across her 25-year practice.
Yhonnie Scarce: Hollowing Earth
18 February - 14 May 2017
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Commissioned by the Museum, Hollowing Earth examines the issues related to the mining of uranium on Aboriginal land.
The sculpture of Bronwyn Oliver
19 November 2016 - 5 February 2017
This first comprehensive survey of Bronwyn Oliver includes 50 key works ranging from large scale works to maquettes and works in paper.
TarraWarra Biennial 2016: Endless Circulation
19 August - 6 November 2016
The Biennial brings together a range of artworks that explore continuity by bringing their past and future into the frame.
Panorama
Selected works from the Eva and Marc Besen Gift to TarraWarra Museum of Art
12 March - 31 July 2016
For this exhibition, the term panorama creates a context for how artists see the landscape – not simply as a depiction of it, but also an evocation of the layers of history within it.
Judy Watson
the scarifier
12 March - 31 July 2016
Watson has created a specially commissioned new installation in response to the Museum’s location in the Yarra Valley.
Howard Arkley (and friends…)
5 December 2015 - 28 February 2016
The exhibition includes over 60 paintings by Arkley from 1974 until 1999, featuring a number of works that have not been shown before along with some of his most iconic images.
Pierre Huyghe: TarraWarra International 2015
29 August - 22 November 2015
The first solo exhibition in Australia by internationally renowned contemporary French artist Pierre Huyghe
The Triumph of Modernism
20 June - 16 August 2015
Spans 60 years of Australian Art and features over 60 iconic works by 26 artists who have shaped the development of modern art in Australia.
Kate Beynon
AN-LI: A CHINESE GHOST TALE
28 March - 8 June 2015
Kate Beynon’s new body of work…
Phase Change
An RMIT Design Laboratory exploring the impact of global warming in the Yarra Valley
28 March - 8 June 2015
Part of ART+CLIMATE=CHANGE 2015, presented by CLIMARTE, 11 April – 17 May 2015
Earth and Sky
JOHN MAWURNDJUL AND GULUMBU YUNUPINGU
28 March - 8 June 2015
Featuring a selection of bark paintings by John Mawurndjul and Gulumbu Yunupingu
The Drunken Buddha
Ian Fairweather
29 November 2014 - 15 March 2015
This fascinating exhibition will bring together all the available works from Ian Fairweather’s The Drunken Buddha series…
Paintings and Drawings
Tony Tuckson
29 November 2014 - 15 March 2015
A group of works that are related to the two splendid Tony Tuckson paintings in the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection…
Found in Translation
Gosia Wlodarczak
29 November 2014 - 15 March 2015
This exhibition will feature the walls and ceiling of this room deconstructed in the North Gallery of TarraWarra Museum of Art…
TarraWarra Biennial 2014
WHISPER IN MY MASK
16 August - 16 November 2014
The TarraWarra Biennial was inaugurated in 2006 as a signature exhibition to identify new developments in contemporary Australian art …
Danie Mellor
Exotic Lies Sacred Ties
10 May - 27 July 2014
This major survey focuses on the past decade of Danie Mellor’s practice, and is the first exhibition to consider in depth the artist’s contribution to contemporary Australian art.
Solitaire
Singular figures in modern and contemporary Australian painting and sculpture
22 February - 27 April 2014
Featuring works from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection and selected loans
Michelle Ussher
Yellow Eyes Burn and Return
22 February - 27 April 2014
Michelle Ussher’s exhibition Yellow Eyes Burn and Return presents a series of new works on paper, recent oil paintings and a sculpture in glazed ceramic.
Russell Drysdale
Defining the Modern Australian Landscape
19 October 2013 - 9 February 2014
Russell Drysdale: Defining the Modern Australian Landscape surveys the artist’s approach to landscape across painting
Future Memorials
Jonathan Jones, Tom Nicholson and Aunty Joy Wandin Murphy
19 October 2013 - 9 February 2014
Animate / Inanimate
29 June - 6 October 2013
Six contemporary artists explore connections between the animate and inanimate worlds.
TarraWarra Museum of Art (TWMA) celebrates its tenth anniversary year in 2013 with the launch of the inaugural TarraWarra International 2013, presenting the exhibition Animate/Inanimate.
Vibrant Matter
20 April - 16 June 2013
Drawing predominantly from the TWMA collection with selected loans, Vibrant Matter features Australian abstract paintings and sculptures from the past six decades …
Nadine Christensen and Anne Wallace
Recent Paintings
21 December 2012 - 14 April 2013
Master of Stillness
Jeffrey Smart paintings 1940 – 2011
21 December 2012 - 1 April 2013
TarraWarra Biennial 2012
Sonic Spheres
5 August - 9 December 2012
The TarraWarra Biennial was inaugurated in 2006 as a signature exhibition to identify new developments in contemporary art practice. The first Biennial Parallel Lives: Australian Painting Today was held in 2006.
Recent Acquisitions
13 - 22 July 2012
A selection of recent acquisitions from the TarraWarra Museum of Art Collection, including: Tony Clark, Tim Johnson, Tim Maguire, Susan Norrie, Stieg Persson, Angelina Pwerle, Sally Smart and Philip Wolfhagen.
Archibald Prize 2012
9 June - 8 July 2012
Spend a perfect winter’s day in the Yarra Valley with people you know! See all 41 Archibald Prize finalists at TarraWarra Museum of Art. Visit the AGNSW website to preview the finalists. People’s Choice Prize Visitors to TarraWarra Museum of Art during the Archibald Prize 2012 will have the opportunity to vote for their favourite work […]
Before the imperative of scale
Selected works from the TWMA collection
25 February - 27 May 2012
Passages: Brian Castro, Khai Liew, John Young
25 February - 27 May 2012
Passages is a collaborative project which presents an enticing combination of thought-provoking literature, elegant design and fine art …
Sue Saxon and Jane Becker
All that is solid melts into air
25 February - 27 May 2012
All that is solid melts into air is a site-specific project by two Sydney artists, Sue Saxon and Jane Becker, who conceived this exhibition as a response to a prevailing anxiety and uncertainty in the natural and socio-political spheres …
Chiharu Shiota
State of Being
25 February - 25 May 2012
Internationally acclaimed artist Chiharu Shiota has transformed the TWMA Vista Walk with an elaborate new installation. A double bass has been cocooned within an intricate and dense web of black yarn which then proliferates in countless layers throughout the space.
Sam Leach
The Ecstasy of Infrastructure
19 November 2011 - 4 March 2012
Selected paintings of Ralph Balson and Edwin Tanner from the TWMA collection form the basis for Sam Leach’s fascinating new suite of works.
William Delafield Cook. A Survey
15 October 2011 - 12 February 2012
Jacqueline Mitelman Facetime
15 October 2011 - 12 February 2012
Jacqueline Mitelman has been a portrait photographer since the mid-1970s. She recently received long overdue recognition when she was awarded the 2011 National Photographic Portrait Prize.
Sandra Leveson
Paintings of Poise and Passion
6 August - 2 October 2011
In the 1970s, Sandra Leveson’s large paintings combined the dazzling effects of op art with references to misty and turbulent landscapes.
Boundary Line
6 August - 2 October 2011
Featuring works from the TWMA collection and selected loans, this exhibition explores the divergent ways in which artists have examined and represent the boundary line between the man-made and natural worlds.
James Morrison
The Great Tasmanian Wars
6 August - 13 November 2011
A rare opportunity to see the Morrison’s magnificent epic painting from the TWMA collection in its entirety.
2011 Archibald Prize
2 - 31 July 2011
Spend a perfect winter’s day in the Yarra Valley with people you know! See the 2011 Archibald Prize at TWMA in July. TarraWarra Museum of Art (TWMA) is proud to be the exclusive Victorian host of the Art Gallery of NSW (AGNSW) 2011 Archibald Prize touring exhibition. Exhibition opening hours Museum Open between 10.30am – 5pm […]
Artwork to Tapestry
2 April - 19 June 2011
TWMA has worked with the Australian Tapestry Workshop (ATW) to create an exhibition that tells the tale of the journey taken from original artwork to tapestry, featuring a selection of contemporary art which has been interpreted via the skilled and talented hands of the weavers of the ATW into a new, unique form in wool […]
Rosslynd Piggott
Dividing Infinity: A Room for Painting
2 April - 19 June 2011
Australian masterpieces from the TWMA collection: The 70s
28 November 2010 - 29 May 2011
Returning to the jewel is a return from exile
7 November 2010 - 20 February 2011
Brett Whiteley
Connections
6 November 2010 - 19 March 2011
Eva and Marc Besen have been lifelong admirers of Brett Whiteley’s oeuvre, collecting significant works from 1964 through to 1983. These works follow Whiteley’s artistic exploration through abstraction, figuration, landscape and still life.
TWMA Contemporary 2010
6 August - 24 October 2010
TWMA invited eight Arts Industry professionals to each nominate one artist for inclusion in TWMA Contemporary 2010.
Bushfire Australia
28 March - 25 July 2010
Bushfire Australia will examine the recurrence of bushfire imagery in the work of Australian artists. The exhibition will draw on works from state, public and private collections, including Australian historical paintings and new works made in direct response to the 2009 fires…
George Baldessin
21 November 2009 - 14 March 2010
The exhibition George Baldessin explores the artist’s remarkable, distinctive contribution to Australian art, selecting paintings and drawings as well as the better known etchings and sculptures from the significant body of work produced by Baldessin before his premature death at the age of 39 in 1978.
Child Like: Selected works from the TWMA collection
21 August - 8 November 2009
There is no doubt that contemporary art holds a great deal of attraction for children…
BEN QUILTY LIVE!
16 August - 15 November 2009
Ben Quilty paints like there is no tomorrow. In less than a decade he has become one of the country’s favourite artists. Quilty uses licks of luscious paint to conjure his subjects which include his beloved LJ Torana, his ‘wasted’ mates, his son Joe and more recently himself. His subjects are modern day memento mori; […]
Tim Storrier, Light and Land
30 May - 16 August 2009
Tim Storrier is an Australian artist whose practice fervently remains outside of categorisation. Storrier works as a dedicated realist painter whose involvement with his recurring subject-matter has allowed his practice and technique to develop in a comprehensive manner.
Revisited
29 March - 2 August 2009
From its inception in the artist’s studio an artwork can travel continents and collections and be displayed privately and publicly. Whilst many art lovers cannot own the works they admire, through the facility of exhibitions the viewing public is permitted a relationship with an artwork. Exhibitions offer us an access point, whether commercial, educational or […]
Denise Green
Evanescence
21 March - 24 May 2009
The exhibition Denise Green: Evanescence at TarraWarra Museum of Art focused upon works created between 2005 and 2008 which explore motifs developed over time that are both personal and transient. The paintings with their elusive shapes and vivid colours capture a mood which transcends their reality.
Mythology & Reality
Contemporary Aboriginal Art From The Gabrielle Pizzi Collection
23 November 2008 - 15 March 2009
TarraWarra Biennial 2008, Lost & Found
An archeology of the Present
1 August - 9 November 2008
Charlotte Day was the guest curator of the second edition of the TarraWarra Biennial…
John R. Neeson
Available Light
30 May - 20 July 2008
John R. Neeson produced an installation project that references the interior of TarraWarra Museum of Art and aspects of the landscape beyond, when he undertook a ‘studio residency’ in the Vista Walk. To date, Neeson has completed 27 similar venue specific installations of representational works …
William Eicholtz:
TarraWarra Primavera
13 May - 15 June 2008
TarraWarra Primavera was a playful Antipodean retelling of Botticelli’s Three Graces from his Primavera painting in the Uffizi Gallery.
Kate Rohde: flourish
20 April - 20 July 2008
Blending the lavishness of the Baroque and Rococo period with her interests in Natural History Kate Rohde conjures scenes from a world not too dissimilar from our own in her new work flourish.
TWMA Architectural Competition 2000
12 April - 20 July 2008
TWMA Architectural Competition 2000 included proposals submitted by invited architects Fender Katsilidis …
Time and Place
Selected works from the TWMA collection
12 April - 20 July 2008
Time and Place was the tenth exhibition in a series which focused on the TWMA collection…
PEEP: Glimpses of the last 4 decades of the Kerry Stokes Collection
25 November 2007 - 6 April 2008
Guy Stuart
Bowls, Vats, Discs and Baffles
12 August - 11 November 2007
This exhibition represented an important moment in Australian art which occurred at the time of the shift of the centre of the international art world from Paris and London to New York…
Snap Freeze: Still Life Now
20 May - 11 November 2007
It is widely claimed among Western historians and art critics that still life, as a genre, exists in the lower levels of the artistic ‘hierarchy’.
Charles Anderson:
A House for Hermes #01: The House of my Father
5 April - 5 August 2007
A House for Hermes was a long meditation on the relationship between memory, place, movement, and ‘home’.
John Nixon, EPW:
POLYCHROME
31 March - 11 May 2007
This large exhibition presented a new multi-coloured group of paintings from John Nixon’s Experimental Painting Workshop in 2007.
The Melba Festival and Nightingale
23 - 25 March 2007
Inspired by the magic that made Dame Nellie Melba an international star in the early 1900s, the Melba Festival celebrated music, arts, wine, food, heritage, racing and the many other community segments which have made the Yarra Valley internationally famous.
Five Decades
26 November 2006 - 25 March 2007
Five Decades was a selection of paintings demonstrating prevailing themes and innovations from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection. For the first time a selection of works from 1950 til the year 2000 was hung chronologically and featured artists such as Fred Williams, Peter Booth, Ralph Balson, Jeffery Smart, John Brack, Brett Whiteley and Rosalie […]
Silvia Bächli: Tables
26 November 2006 - 25 March 2007
Tables was a special exhibition of works by Swiss artist Silvia Bächli, in collaboration with Swiss curator Martin Schwander. Bächli works with ink on paper creating and grouping what she describes as ‘families’.
TarraWarra Biennial 2006
Parallel Lives: Australian Painting Today
4 August - 12 November 2006
TarraWarra Museum of Art invited renowned curator, Victoria Lynn, to provide an independent view of painting in her curation of this inaugural biennial exhibition.
Recent Acquisitions
6 June - 23 July 2006
A selection of recent acquisitions from the TarraWarra Museum of Art Collection as selected by the Director, Maudie Palmer. Angela Brennan, Aida Tomescue, Brent Harris, Robert Jacks, Rosslynd Piggott, Roger Kemp and Janet Dawson.
Heart & Mind
11 April - 23 July 2006
The exhibition Heart & Mind featured five major Australian artists from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection: Jan Senbergs, Rick Amor, Jenny Watson, Melinda Harper and William Kelly.
Paul Partos – Final Works 2002
19 February - 4 June 2006
This unprecedented exhibition featured works that Paul Partos created during the last year of his life. Partos was little more than a mid-career artist when he was advised in December 2001 that he was dying of a brain tumor.
Orient/Occident: John Young
A survey of works 1979-2005
1 November 2005 - 2 April 2006
This first major survey of John Young’s practice addressed a period of profound artistic and intellectual shifts, in both Australia and internationally.
Warm
23 August 2005 - 12 February 2006
The exhibition Warm explored the way in which artists have used colour to evoke emotion, space, movement and culture. This exhibition derived its title from the terminology used to describe the condition of certain colour’s as warm.
Potters Cottage
Warrandyte
19 August - 1 October 2005
Work of the Founding and Associate Members An Introductory Exhibition from the Collection of John Nixon
Arthur Boyd
Reflections
25 July - 15 November 2005
Environmental and sociological issues made accessible through the magic of myth.
6 years abstracted: 1967 – 1972
29 May - 23 October 2005
In the 1960s, as the New York School, greatly supported by Clement Greenberg, grew as an artistic mecca, increasingly Australian artists focused their artistic practice towards a less provincial and more international sphere.
Pulse
Paintings by John Olsen 1961-2005
29 May - 23 October 2005
Gary Catalano observed that Olsen’s radicalism came from his ability to play ‘havoc with our conventional aesthetic expectations’, that he challenges us to forge beyond our initial response and enter into the ‘vitality’ of his paintings.
Rebecca Smith – TarraWarra Catchment
19 April - 14 August 2005
Rebecca Smith has exhibited in over 12 solo exhibitions and participated in over 40 group exhibitions. Born in Glen Falls, New York in 1954, Smith graduated from the Sarah Lawrence College in 1976 and attended the Studio School in NYC.
Robert Baines: Close Up
6 March - 30 June 2005
This exhibition provided an opportunity to examine, to fathom the ambiguities of Baines’ jewellery. To imagine these small models as large scale sculptures. To appreciate the combination of the banal with the classical; of that which is precious with that which is playful or absurd. To understand the quality of a magical and masterful craft.
Melbourne Masters Architecture
14 November 2004 - 3 April 2005
‘Vibrant architectural cultures, like other intellectual domains, straddle two or three differing views about the nature of architectural endeavors.
A Sense of Place
7 November 2004 - 22 May 2005
This exhibition considered the insistence of landscape in the history of Australian visual art, and explored the meaning of place in our lives.
Lollypop Forest
Installation 1 Colin Duncan
7 November 2004 - 18 July 2005
In lollypop forest, installation 1, small vector graphics of circles and rectangles join to make lollypops that populate the wall with a randomness of sown seeds of data.
Robert Jacks
Paintings/Sculptures Melbourne/New York 1967-
22 August - 7 November 2004
This exhibition was built around Robert Jacks’ Red Painting in the TWMA collection.
Echo
30 May - 20 October 2004
The second major exhibition based on the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection, Echo, was an exhibition of paintings, decorative art and found objects, with works from private and public collections complementing paintings from the TWMA collection.
urban/exurban
23 April - 16 August 2004
Robert Owen: The text of light
18 December 2003 - 16 April 2004
Throughout a sustained practice of more than four decades, Robert Owen has worked across a range of media moving between painting, drawing, sculpture and installation …
New Beaut Country
18 December 2003 - 20 May 2004
The inaugural exhibition at the new museum New Beaut Country was a director’s choice selection and presented an overview of the TWMA collection.
Still
9 February - 29 June 2003
Still, an exhibition selected from the TarraWarra Museum of Art collection by Director Maudie Palmer, was the third and final exhibition held at the Metropolitan Meat Market by TWMA.
Gesture and geometry
29 August 2002 - 2 February 2003
Using the intimate proportions and accessible site of the museum’s temporary home at the Metropolitan Meat Market Art Centre, a series of rotating exhibitions from the collection has been devised by Maudie Palmer…
Genesis
24 April - 25 August 2002
Using the intimate proportions and accessible site of the museum’s temporary home at the Metropolitan Meat Market Art Centre, a series of rotating exhibitions from the collection has been devised by Maudie Palmer