Some lucky Armidale residents got a sneak preview on Wednesday night to see NERAM’s latest acquisitions – months, or even years, before they may be displayed.
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Artists, galleries, and private collectors have donated 111 items over the last couple of years, including paintings, prints, sketches, and illuminated manuscripts.
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“We've received quite an extraordinary amount of collections over the past 12 to 18 months,” director Rachael Parsons said.
“But because we program so far in advance, and because we have so many art works in the collection, anyway, it can often take us a little while before these art works are shown publicly or exhibited.
“We've given some of our members, supporters, and community an opportunity to see some of the things that have come in, and to get excited about some of those fantastic gifts that we've received.”
Several artists donated their work, among them Lucy Culliton (a large painting), Euan McLeod (prints), Robert Moore (an artist’s book), Tamworth-based artist Gabrielle Collins (shown in NERAM’s 2016 “Bush to Bay” exhibition), and Max Miller.
Other items come from galleries, or from private collectors and their families.
Donations like these, Ms Parsons said, are the main way NERAM’s collection grows.
“We appreciate so much that artists would like to see their work within our collection, or donors would like to see the work that they have loved, that they valued, to come into NERAM's collection.
“It expands what we are able to show, and ensures the continuing relevance and quality of our collection moving on.”
Once the items are acquired into the collection, it's a process of waiting to see where they might fit into an exhibition program.
“We tend to program quite far in advance, 12 to 18 months,” Ms Parsons said, “and we do a broad range of thematic exhibitions that highlight aspects of the collection.
“It's really about waiting to see when some of these works might make sense within that broader program.”
Some works might fit into other exhibitions, depending on those shows’ concepts and themes.
Others – like 76 prints by Elisabeth Cumming, a full collection of her etchings and printwork – may be the basis for a future exhibition.
NERAM, in Kentucky Street, is open daily except Mondays.
Exhibitions include photos from Papua New Guinea; artworks by Walcha-based Myfanwy Gulliver; abstract art within NERAM’s collections; and a commemoration of the Myall Creek massacre.