On a balmy Canberra evening last December, the lawn at the National Gallery of Australia is a crowded site of celebration. Governor-General Sam Mostyn weaves through the crowd with artist Sally Scales, chair of the NGA’s First Nations Advisory Group. Among the guests is Archie Moore, Australia’s Golden Lion-winning artist in the 2024 Venice Biennale. Chef Kylie Kwong and her wife, the artist Nell, are in the mix. As is Ryan Stokes, chairman of the National Gallery Council, and Philip Bacon, the supremely connected Brisbane art gallery owner and acting chair of the NGA Foundation Board. It’s the opening party for the NGA’s Fifth Indigenous Art Triennial: After the Rain, and there’s a frisson in the air.
Days earlier, the exhibition’s artistic director, Tony Albert, received the insignia of Le Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the Republic of France. The French ambassador is here on the lawn too. Ngunnawal elder Jude Barlow gives the Welcome to Country. “For Aboriginal people, art is part of who we are,” she says. “It’s one of the ways in which we share our stories and our truths.”
