THE COLLECTION

PREDATOR BECOMES PREY

9th July - 18th September

When the word Predator comes to mind, we may naturally think of animals that hunt, or prey on other animals. We perhaps overlook that the smallest of insects can become predators to the most fearsome of creatures in the animal kingdom. Predator becomes Prey is an exhibition that explores the delicate balance of nature and the complex relationship between animals and humans that interconnects us both from birth until death. This continual connection is expressed through our interaction and intrigue with the animal world, ensuring our place within the cycle of life.

Curated by Mariam Abboud

Image Credit: Petrina Hicks, Bird Fingers, 2013, pigment prints on Hahnemühle Photo Rag Pearl paper 320gsm. Collection Western Plains Cultural Centre, Purchased with funds provided by the Friends of the Western Plains Cultural Centre.

CAPTURING NATURE
Early photography at the Australian Museum 1857- 1893 

4th June - 23rd October

In Capturing Nature, we travel back to a time when photography was revolutionising science, art and society. 

These never-before-seen images dating from 1857 to 1893 have been printed from the Australian Museum’s collection of glass plate negatives and are some of Australia’s earliest natural history photographs. Sitting at the nexus of science and art, they tell both the story of pioneering research as well as the advent of photography in the young colony less than 20 years after the birth of photography in Europe. 

A touring exhibition created by the Australian Museum. 

Image Credit: Gerard Kreft with the newly discovered manta ray, Manta alfredi, in the Museum’s courtyard in 1869. Photos © Australian Museum. 

MELISSA KELLY

NOT FRAGILE LIKE A FLOWER

9th July - 18th September

Not Fragile Like a Flower is an exhibition of ceramics by Gilgandra-based artist Melissa Kelly, that explores and challenges the ways society has indoctrinated women into traditional roles. Drawing on lived experiences, Kelly fashions figurative zoomorphised forms that reflect and contemplate the various stages of life for women during marriage, motherhood and after. Not Fragile Like a Flower is a body of work that explores resilience, transformation and growth, allowing for adaptation through life’s continual changes.  

This is a HomeGround exhibition, produced by WPCC and supported by Orana Arts. HomeGround is sponsored by Wingewarra Dental.

Curated by Mariam Abboud

IN CONVERSATION SATURDAY 9 JULY 2PM

Image Credit Melissa Kelly, Bird Woman, 2021, Stoneware and paint. Image © the artist.  

EXPERIMENTA LIFE FORMS: INTERNATIONAL TRIENNIAL OF MEDIA ART

2nd July - 18th September

Experimenta Life Forms: International Triennial of Media Art features 26
contemporary Australian and International artists working across diverse artforms – including robotics, bio-art, screen-based works, installations, participatory and generative art. The exhibition explores the changing notions of life in response to new scientific research and technological change. While the focus is on biological life, there are also artworks that look to a future with sentient machines and the possibilities afforded by biotechnology research. In unexpected, playful and challenging ways the exhibition connects us to the complexity and messiness of the life that envelops us.

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Curated by Jonathan Parsons and Lubi Thomas
Associate Curator: Jessica Clark

EVENT OPENING FRIDAY 8 JULY 6PM

Image Credit:  Justine Emard, Soul Shift, 2018. Video still. Image courtesy of the artist.

WASTE TO ART

SOFT PLASTICS

7th May - 26th June

Waste to Art is an annual competition that features artworks created by community members using recycled and unwanted materials. The results are highly imaginative and thought-provoking with the collected artworks celebrating recycling and sustainable living. This year’s theme is Soft Plastics.

Curated by Phil Aitken, WPCC.

OFFICIAL OPENING AND PRIZE: SATURDAY 21 MAY 2PM

Image Credit: William Munro, The Motorbike, 2021, found metal. Image © WPCC.

TAYLA MARTIN

FLOOD TO DUST 

7th May - 3rd July

Flood to Dust is an exhibition by Wagga Wagga based artist, Tayla Martin featuring a series of photographic and video works documenting the ever changing landscapes across regional NSW. Martin adopts a documentary style approach highlighting the major environmental challenges that have swept across the region over the past several years, and the social impacts that these brought with them. Martin’s body of work focuses on embodying the true essence of human resilience and spirit within communities affected by these events.

ARTIST TALK SATURDAY 7 MAY 2PM

Curated by Mariam Abboud

Image Credit: Tayla Martin, Checking the Dam Level, 2020, photographic print. Image © the artist.

This is a HomeGround exhibition, produced by WPCC and supported by Orana Arts.

FROM THE VAULT

THE PLEASURE OF YOUR COMPANY IS REQUESTED: A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE BALL

14th March - 3rd July

Attending a Ball was the epitome of social interaction in the 19th and early twentieth centuries. More than just a pleasurable activity, it had an important social function. Held to celebrate important local events, to raise funds for charities and to showcase the latest debutantes, they provided one of the few public spaces where young men and women could interact, and dancing offered an opportunity to flirt, admire and attract. This exhibition at the Western Plains Cultural Centre will explore the world of the Ball, and its importance to the social fabric of the region.  

Image Credit: Hospital Ball at Empire Hall, Macquarie Street, Dubbo, 9 August 1912, Local Studies Collection, Dubbo Regional Council, D0000510

ARLO MOUNTFORD

THE FOLLY, THE TRIUMPH & THE LAMENT

4th June - 26th June

Arlo Mountford is one of Australia's most interesting contemporary artists. His diverse practice mines art history, mass media, screen culture and the internet; working with large-scale interactive installations that integrate sound, video and animation. From 2009-2011, Mountford produced animations based on paintings by Pieter Brueghel the Elder (c1525-1569) and Jean-Antoine Watteau (1684-1721), in which he meticulously reproduced the original works with the addition of sound and movement. These works reinvigorate these iconic paintings, becoming new works that explore the act of making, the history of western art and its relationship to contemporary art practice, and how we engage with the past, narrative and myth. The Folly (2009), The Triumph (2010) and The Lament (2011) are presented together for the very first time.

Curated by Kent Buchanan

Image Credit Arlo Mountford, The Folly [still], 2008, 3-channel digital animation and 4-channel audio, 9 mins. Collection Western Plains Cultural Centre. Purchased with funds provided by the Friends of Western Plains Cultural Centre, 2009

THE QUEEN'S ALBUM

12th February - 29th May

Curated by senior curator, Dr Penny Stannard and curator, Bonnie Wildie, The Queen’s Album explores the unique story of an album of photographs gifted to Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle in 1882 on behalf of the people of NSW. The album contained 64 photographic images of sites and scenes in Sydney and regional NSW that were constructed to promote NSW as a progressive and desirable place, and to consolidate its position within the British Empire. At the time, the album was described as a ‘graceful tribute of loyalty’ to Queen Victoria. Today, its whereabouts are unknown.

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In 2018 NSW State Archives rediscovered most of the original photographic glass plate negatives in the State Archives Collection which were conserved, digitised and reproduced for the exhibition project.

Image Credit: Photographer unknown. Picton Viaduct over Stonequarry Creek 1870 Digital reproduction from glass plate negative [detail] NSW State Archives, NRS 4481 SH1117

SPOWERS & SYME

26th February - 29th May

Celebrating the artistic friendship of Melbourne artists Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme, the National Gallery Touring Exhibition Spowers & Syme will present the changing face of Inter-war Australia through the perspective of two pioneering, modern women artists.

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The exhibition offers rare insight into the unlikely collaboration between the daughters of rival media families. Studying together in Paris and later with avant-garde printmaker Claude Flight in London, Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme returned to the conservative art world of Australia – where they became enthusiastic exponents of modern art in Melbourne during the 1930s and ‘40s.

Spowers & Syme is a National Gallery of Australia Touring Exhibition supported by Visions of Australia, Major Patron David Thomas AM and the Gordon Darling Foundation. Spowers & Syme is a Know My Name project.

EVENT OPENING FRIDAY 25 FEBRUARY 6PM

Image Credit: Eveline Syme, The Factory, 1933, Colour linocut, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, purchased 1979, © Estate of Eveline Syme.

JACK RANDELL

ANIMAL STUDIES

12th February - 1st May

We’ve been pretty good at adopting animals as tribal symbols, footy codes, advertising, and astrology. These are nuanced ways of describing ourselves. “She has the courage of a lion” or “He was as meek as a lamb.” Humans have recently had to consider their own potential collective demise and been witness to extinction of dozens of other species. Animal Studies explores a shared existence. Each artwork in this series considers a shared space, a shared presence. We say that elephants never forget -  what is it that they think? What is it that a rhinoceros senses with its gaze and tough dry skin?

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Animal Studies is a body of work that has occupied Jack Randell for the last two years and features drawings, paintings, and media studies of singular creatures animated for the viewer to consider the animal’s gaze upon us. What do they see? What do they think and dream? If they thought like us, and I suspect they don’t, what would they think of our use of their shared ecology?

Curated by Dr Andrew Frost

EVENT OPENING FRIDAY 11 FEBRUARY 6PM

ARTIST TALK SATURDAY 12 FEBRUARY 11AM

Image Credit: Jack Randell, Przewalski’s Horse, 2020, mixed media on polypropylene. Image © the artist.

GEOFF THOMAS

ALL ABOUT THE MATERIAL

12th February - 1st May

All About the Material is an exhibition that showcases the prolific practice of Gilgandra-based potter, Geoff Thomas as he explores both the materiality and processes involved in creating wood-fired pottery. Drawing on East Asian pottery practices, Thomas reflects on his own identity and roles as farmer and potter, using clay as the medium to convey beauty within both worlds. All About the Material is a body of work that combines process, experimentation and chance as overarching elements that influence the outcome.

Curated by Mariam Abboud

Image Credit: Geoff Thomas, Anagama Jar and Bowl, 2020, Anagama fired, fire box pot, clay, natural fly ash glaze, shell wads, four-day firing, cypress pine fuel and ash glaze, clay, 18-hour firing, bourry box kiln. Image © the artist.

This is a HomeGround exhibition, produced by WPCC and supported by Orana Arts.

MEL O'CALLAGHAN

CENTRE OF THE CENTRE

20th November 2021 - 20th February 2022

Centre of the Centre is inspired by a small mineral containing a tiny pocket of water, possibly millions of years old, which was gifted to the artist by her grandfather, renowned Australian mineralogist, Albert Chapman.

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During 2018 and 2019 Mel O’Callaghan travelled to two underwater locations, the East Pacific Rise, and the Verde Island Passage in the Philippines – one of the World’s most productive and concentrated ecosystems in the world, dubbed the ‘centre of the centre’.

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For this exhibition, O’Callaghan has engaged some of the world’s leading scientists. Filming deep underwater, the team observed microscopic ‘extremophiles’ – organisms that thrive in extreme environmental conditions. The footage captures these organisms moving in and out of gases from simultaneously freezing ocean temperatures and superheated hydrothermal vents.

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O’Callaghan has translated these investigations into an immersive exhibition experience that features a large-scale video work, accompanied by glass forms that entwine a choreography of performance, breathing and sculpture.

Mel O'Callaghan's Centre of the Centre was curated and developed by Artspace and is touring nationally with Museum and  Galleries of NSW. Centre of the Centre is co-commissioned by Le Confort Moderne, Poitiers, Artspace, Sydney, and the University of Queensland Art Museum, Brisbane with commissioning partners Andrew Cameron AM, Cathy Cameron, Peter Wilson and James Emmett, and lead supporter, Kronenberg Mais Wright.

The development and presentation of Centre of the Centre is supported by the Fondation des Artistes, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and the US National Science Foundation. This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australian Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.

Image Credit: Mel O’Callaghan, Respire, Respire, 2019, performance and installation view, Artspace, Sydney, courtesy the artist and Kronenberg Mais Wright, Sydney; Galerie Allen, Paris; Belo-Galsterer, Lisbon. Photo - Document Photography.

THROUGH A DIFFERENT LENS: CAZNEAUX BY THE WATER

21st December 2021 - 6th February 2022

Harold Cazneaux (1878-1953), was a giant in the history of Australian photography. ‘Through a Different Lens’ takes us back in time to Cazneaux’s soft focus Australia and gives us an insight into this significant photographer’s life.

This exhibition of more than 50 original pieces presents this aspect of Cazneaux’s art, reflecting how water and  Sydney Harbour fits within his work, his signature pictorial photographic style and his foray into modernism and abstract form.

SCOTT HOWIE

HOW GOOD IS UNAUSTRALIA

4th December 2021 - 6th February 2022

how good is unaustralia is an exhibition of work by Wagga Wagga-based artist, Scott Howie featuring a series of screen-based performances, sculptures and installations that offer a cheeky and provocative view
to imagining the possibility of an unaustralia. Howie adopts a satirical
lens as he questions the nationalistic values associated with being Australian, revealing a body of work that allows us to question those unfulfilled promises and hopes of being Australian.

LEILA JEFFREYS

FLOCK

20th October - 28th November 2021

Leila Jeffreys utilises photography and video to create intimate images of birds as a means to highlight their idiosyncratic beauty and their unique relationship to humans and the natural world. Eschewing any outside elements that would distract from her subjects, Jeffreys’ human-sized portraits of native pigeons and doves of New Guinea and Australia, featured in this exhibition, revealing them to be surprisingly diverse, unlike the everyday image we may have of them. The series, titled ‘Ornithurae’, allows us to see these busy birds up close and in minute detail, which would otherwise be impossible in real life.

Image Credit Leila Jeffreys, ‘Nature Is Not A Place To Visit. It Is Home.’, 2019. Production still of multi-channel digital video. 8min 20sec on continuous loop. Western Plains Cultural Centre Collection, donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts program by Leila Jeffreys.

BUILDING COMMUNITY:
WALLACE & McGEE, WALMAC AND THE
CONSTRUCTION OF THE WEST

31st July - 7th November 2021

What do the RAAF Base, St Raphael’s Church in Cowra, St Mary’s School, Wellington, the Nyngan RSL Club, the Forbes Olympic Pool and the Amaroo Hotel have in common? A Dubbo-based company built them all.

This exhibition will explore the history of the company as well as its impact on the establishment and consolidation of communities across the western region.

Image Credit: Photographer unknown, Believed to be Phil McGee in front of Wallace and McGee’s shed in Wingewarra Street, Dubbo c1930s, gelatin silver print, Local Studies Collection, Dubbo Regional Council.

JAMFACTORY ICON ANGELA VALAMANESH

ABOUT BEING HERE

20th October - 7th November 2021

JamFactory’s ICON series celebrates the achievements of South Australia’s most influential artists working in craft-based media. Inspired by the symbiosis between science and poetry, Angela Valamanesh’s artworks elicit intrigue and a strong sense of personal investigation as she manipulates seemingly familiar anatomical, botanical and parasitic forms in beguiling and unusual ways. Primarily known for her biomorphic ceramic sculptures, this exhibition also celebrates the artist’s evocative drawings, watercolours, and mixed media works from her developing style of the late 1990s until present.

Image Credit Angela Valamanesh, Various friends and enemies no. 6, 2016. Photo: Michael Kluvanek.

LINDY LEE

MOON IN A DEW DROP

22nd May - 1 August 2021

Moon in a Dew Drop is an exhibition of the work of influential Australian Chinese artist Lindy Lee. Lee’s shimmering, meditative and thought-provoking works feature in this major national touring exhibition, which draws on her experience of living between two cultures.​

Using a spectacular array of processes which include flinging molten bronze, burning paper and allowing the rain to transform surfaces, Lee draws on her Australian and Chinese heritage to develop works that engage with the history of art, cultural authenticity, personal identity and the cosmos. Key influences are the philosophies of Daoism and Ch’an (Zen) Buddhism, which explore the connections between humanity and nature.​

This exhibition will introduce audiences to works from across the artist’s extensive career, from early photocopy artworks, to her research into her family history and recent paintings and sculptures created using fire and water.

​Exhibition organised and toured by the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia. This project has been assisted by the Australian Government’s Visions of Australia program.

Curated by MCA Director, Elizabeth Ann Macgregor OBE

Image Credit: Lindy Lee, The Silence of Painters, 1989, photocopy, synthetic polymer paint on paper, Museum of Contemporary Art, gift of Loti Smorgon AO and Victor Smorgon AC, 1995, image courtesy the artist and Museum of Contemporary Art, Image © artist 

BEHIND THE LINES: THE YEAR IN POLITICAL CARTOONS

2020 A DOG'S BREAKFAST

29th May - 18th July 2021

In a year that some have politely described as ‘a dog’s breakfast’, this year’s theme encompasses 2020’s mix of disruption and uncertainty. The term seems particularly fitting for something so unappealing – a year filled with mess, turmoil and failed attempts.

From the bushfire summer to the pandemic and global economic woes, Australia’s political cartoonists have had plenty to work with. They have cast their eyes over the whole dog and pony show. There’s the usual dog-eat-dog world of politics, with its top dogs, sly dogs and people thrown to the dogs. But they’ve also watched on as we’ve embraced panic buying, curves (on graphs and on ourselves) and experts in our midst (or at least at our press conferences). And masks. It’s been a year with plenty of masks.

In this year’s exhibition, visual cues from overlapping crises pepper the cartoons: Hawaiian shirts and burnt trees give way to masks and spiky balls. Fortunately, our cartoonists have also captured moments of goodness and humour amid the rolling drama. With luck, we can look back on 2020 – a masked, sloppy mess of a year – and send it firmly back to the doghouse where it belongs. The 2020 Cartoonist of the Year is Cathy Wilcox, cartoonist for the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age.

Behind the Lines is an annual onsite and travelling exhibition developed by the Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House. 

Curated by Holly Williams, The Curator’s Department

Image Credit Cathy Wilcox, A Dog’s Breakfast, Behind the Lines 2020. Image © artist.

TRUE TO LIFE LIKENESS: A HISTORY OF VINCENT'S STUDIO

24th October - 23 May 2921

Vincent's Studio was a photographic studio that operated in Dubbo and region from the early 1900s to the late 1970s. Before phone cameras and social media, photographic studios played a crucial role within a community, documenting and producing photographs of weddings, debutante balls, engagements, couples, nurses, service personnel, elected officials, sporting teams, portraits, passport photographs, families, children, babies, and assorted buildings.

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The collection of negatives, logbooks, and other materials that make up the Vincent's Studio collection had begun to significantly deteriorate by the time they were donated to the Dubbo & District Family History Society (DDFHS). Over a number of years, DDFHS volunteers have tirelessly cleaned, scanned, catalogued, and researched the collection, allowing it to be accessed and utilised by the general public.

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This exhibition charts the history of photographic studios, the Vincent's Studio collection and the invaluable work of volunteer-run organisations like DDFHS in preserving our material culture.

This exhibition is a collaboration between Western Plains Cultural Centre, Local Studies and Dubbo & District Family History Society.

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Any new information on the images in our exhibit will help us learn more about the archive and ultimately about our community. If you recognise anyone in the photos - let us know! If you suspect your family may have had photos taken by Vincent's Studio, click on the link below and check the Index on the Dubbo & District Family History Society website.​

Image Credit: A.J. Vincent; Vincent's Studio, Hospital Ball at Empire Hall, Macquarie Street; Dubbo, 9th August 1912. 1912 silver gelatin print; Image (C) Local Studies collection, Dubbo Regional Council

WASTE 2 ART

13th March - 16TH May 2021

Waste To Art is a community art exhibition and competition showcasing reused & recyclable waste materials. This exciting and innovative challenge invites schools, community groups and individuals to transform rubbish into art and design.

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Dubbo Regional Council is a proud NetWaste member and supports community's commitment to re-use and recycle through creative expression. While the artworks do not have to be made using the theme Aluminium and Steel Cans, the theme provides a focus for waste challenges and education programs.

2020 JACARANDA ACQUISITIVE DRAWING AWARD

13th March - 16th May 2021

Jacaranda Acquisitive Drawing Award (JADA) is Grafton Regional Gallery's flagship art prize, sponsored by the Friends of the Gallery.

Established in 1988 the JADA celebrates drawing in all its splendour from hyper-realism to the expressive and abstract, each evokes a poetic and emotional response to the human condition and our environment. Many of the works question and challenge the notion of traditional drawing; while others provide a contemporary perspective and reinvigorate those traditions. ​

In 2020 the $35,000 prize received a record 659 entries from 521 artists throughout Australia with 56 finalists selected for the exhibition and subsequent tour.

EVENT OPENING 19 MARCH 6PM

Image Credit: Teo Treloar This is impermanence, (detail), 2019, graphite pencil on paper, 56 x 76 cm u/f. Courtesy of the Artist and Andrew Baker Art Dealer. Image © artist.   

CORAL DOLAN

HERSTORY

13th February - 16th May 2021

Official Opening: 20 February 2pm

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Herstory by Dubbo based artist Coral Dolan features works that explore and celebrate the lives of women in regional NSW. Inspired by their courageous stories of travelling and settling in isolated areas, Dolan fashions multi-layered works from found ‘women’s objects’, eco printed fabrics, and preserved botanicals; sealing them with preserving wax, with the intent to create artefacts that encapsulate the hitherto untold stories of these women.

Herstory is an exhibition where Dolan sheds light on the importance of preserving these historic personal and cultural stories of regional women, before they risk being forgotten.

This is a HomeGround exhibition, produced by WPCC and supported by Orana Arts.

Curated by Mariam Abboud

Herstory is an exhibition, which explores and celebrates the personal and cultural stories of regional women throughout history. Join us for this artist talk, as Coral Dolan discuss how these women have inspired this multi-layered body of work, paying homage to their memory. 

This is a HomeGround exhibition, WPCCs emerging regional artist program. The HomeGround program is proudly supported by: Wingewarra Dental 

Image Credit Coral Dolan, Həːst(ə)ré, 2020, Cyanotype print, wax, botanical material, eco printed linen and silk, gold leaf, thread. Image courtesy of artist

NERIDAH STOCKLEY

A SECULAR VIEW

30th January - 7th March

Neridah Stockley: A Secular View is an exhibition spanning twenty-five years of sustained practice by Northern Territory based artist Neridah Stockley. Whilst Stockley is best known as a painter, this survey reveals the diversity of her practice including drawings, collage, dry point etchings and a growing body of ceramic work.

Stockley's work is characterised by abstracted compositions that hint at narrative or symbolic content, traversing memory and experience in an ongoing dialogue with visual interpretation. Domestic in scale, she invites the viewer to encounter a section of surveyed and deconstructed landscape, through a process of re-visioning the natural and manufactured world into linear and geometric planes and forms.

Curated by Gillian Shaw, Art Curator, University of Newcastle Art Gallery.

EVENT OPENING 29 JANUARY 6PM

Image Credit: Summer 1, 2012, acrylic on hardboard, 50 x 50cm. Image c Christine Godden