Elegance in Heritage: First Nations Jewellery Unveiled
Join us for the official opening event on Saturday 5 July 2025 from 4.30–6pm.

Open every day: The exhibition will be open every day from 12–5pm during NAIDOC Week, Sunday 6 July to Sunday 13 July 2025.

Elegance in Heritage: First Nations Jewellery Unveiled showcases a collection of contemporary First Nations inspired jewellery pieces, wearable by all, with each piece narrating a unique cultural story.

This curated selection of works merges high jewellery with cultural storytelling, offering rare craftsmanship and heritage symbolism in a refined atmosphere.

Embracing this year's theme for NAIDOC Week 2025, The Next Generation: Strength, Vision & Legacy, the exhibition—designed and curated by local jeweller Thomas Coen Bonson—celebrates First Nations heritage and its enduring impact.

Thomas Coen Bonson, a proud Jawoyn and Kala Lagaw Ya man, is from a small Aboriginal community in Darwin. His deep connection to his culture is rooted in fishing and painting with his father. With over a decade of experience, Thomas crafts high-quality, bespoke jewellery that intertwines cultural heritage with technical precision. In 2024, he was honoured with the Rising Star award at the inaugural Australian Jewellery Industry Awards.

“My jewellery is a reflection of my heritage, family, and community. Each piece tells a story, blending traditional narratives with contemporary design. Through my work, I aim to share the richness of First Nations culture, creating wearable art that resonates with both personal and cultural significance.” Thomas Coen Bonson

Join us for the opening event at ANCA Gallery Wednesday 4 June from 5.30pm

Rich and Rare is a submersive exhibition, the outcome of several years of creative research into the (almost) lost world of ostrea angasi (native flat oyster) reefs.

Jacqui has materialised the angasi’s fragility, sensitivity, delicacy and now-skeletal distribution in a piece of hand-made cloth, assembled from machine-embroidered lace oysters. This ethereal artefact is used in performance photography, cyanotype, video and installation to create a watery world of light and shadow, accretion, growth, collapse and decay. Through performance, Jacqui explores colonial history and contemporary relationships to the reefs, calling back to traditions of lace use in dress, at the table and in ritual: decorating, dressing, veiling, revealing.  

After encountering bleached ostrea angasi shells in a deposit near Eden, NSW in 2021, Jacqui began a personal investigation that has taken her from Yuin country on south coast of NSW to north-eastern Lutruwita/Tasmania and west to Oyster Harbour in Kinjarling/Albany, WA. Angasi once formed plentiful reefs around Australia’s southern shoreline, some of them hectares in size. Extraction, overconsumption and environmental change brought them close to extinction within a century of European arrival.

Jacqui has worked to understand what collective memory and forgetting, loss, grief and hope might mean for the fate of shellfish reefs and all the species that can depend on them. How do we treat our celebrated ‘beauties, rich and rare’? How do we become collaborators and allies with other species, to the benefit of us all?

Jacqui Malins is a multi-disciplinary artist and writer, whose practice incorporates sculpture, video, installation, performance, poetry and spoken word, drawing and photography. Jacqui is interested in the dynamics of environments and the relationships, patterns and forces shaping organisms—including the human one. Her base is Ngunawal/Ngambri country, Canberra.

FREE Artist Talk Saturday 14 June from 2 to 3pm. All welcome!

Join Jacqui Malins for a presentation and discussion about the research and processes behind Rich and Rare at the ANCA Gallery. Jacqui will talk about her pilgrimage to try and see the last remaining wild Ostrea angasi reef in north-western Lutruwita/Tasmania, her subsequent residency in Kinjarling/Albany and her how this body of work has evolved from works on paper to machine embroidered lace, video, performance and photography.

Ticketed Event: Rich & Rare Oyster Saloon—Tasting & Discussion.
Saturday 21 June from 3.30 to 4.30pm.

Taste Ostrea angasi (native flat) oysters alongside Sydney Rock Oysters, in conversation with artist Jacqui Malins at her exhibition Rich and Rare.

Jacqui has been researching the almost-lost world of native flat oyster (ostrea angasi) reefs for three years, but she has not yet eaten an angasi oyster.

Join Jacqui for her first tasting of angasi oysters, farmed by Merimbula Gourmet Oysters and brought to Canberra especially for this occasion. We will compare the angasi with the more familiar Sydney Rock Oyster (saccostrea glomerata), and discuss the allure of eating the 'rich and rare', the role of shellfish in marine ecology, the role of taste and smell in memory, and the progress and future of shellfish reef restoration.

Choose a half-dozen oysters ($25) or a full dozen ($35). You will be served half of each variety, plus bread, cheese and fruit and sparkling water or wine.

Tickets essential, numbers strictly limited.

Closing reception Sunday 22 June from 3 to 4pm.

Join Jacqui to celebrate the close of Rich and Rare, her submersive exhibition about the (almost) lost world of Ostrea angasi (native flat oyster) reefs. It will also be an opportunity for informal discussion about the research and creative processes behind this body of work.

Join us for the opening event at ANCA Gallery Wednesday 14 May from 5.30pm

Stilleven by Rose-Mary Faulkner

Stilleven is an exhibition of glass work by Rose-Mary Faulkner, considering connections to places and objects as both self portraiture and representative of lived experience and narrative. Softly focused compositions of domestic settings form an avenue to explore dynamics of the absence and presence of people and bodies, connection to environments we embody and the way objects can exist as metaphors.

The domestic and the still life are two realms that have been historically dismissed. Still life throughout art history has often been regarded as the lowest rank of art expression; the term stilleven drawn from the origins of the still life genre in Dutch meaning no more than inanimate objects. However cultural, economic, and theological disguised symbolism makes them deeply important in portraying the narrative or depiction of people’s lives, the inanimate objects bearing witness to change and time and the nature of the human experience. Similarly, the domestic has and regularly still is, regarded as undervalued and a woman’s realm, holding items associated with acts of service and care. Stilleven explores the familiarity and femininity of these themes—as ones that hold importance, narrative and deep meaning despite appearing simplistic or ordinary, considering intersections of contemporary and classic. Using processes of kiln formed glass and hand bent neon lighting, Rose-Mary seeks to depict what is all at once familiar, challenging and precious, in amongst the subtle rhythms of daily life.

Rose-Mary Faulkner is a glass and print artist based in Canberra, on Ngunnawal and Ngambri land. She graduated with first class honours from the Australian National University School of Art and Design in 2016. Since graduating, her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including in the USA, Berlin and Toyama, and has been acquired as part of the national glass collection at the Wagga Wagga National Art Glass Gallery. In 2024 Rose-Mary was commissioned to make a permanent public artwork for No Name Lane as part of the Canberra Art Biennial. Rose-Mary works as an arts educator, and creates work both at Canberra Glassworks and her home studio which she shares with her partner and glass artist, Rob Schwartz.

Join us for the launch event at ANCA Gallery Wednesday 23 April from 5.30pm

‘Emotional Landscapes II’ by Margaret Gordon, Manuel Pfeiffer and Alan Pomeroy is curated by Eva van Gorsel.

‘Emotional Landscapes II’ explores the philosophical idea of humanity's place within the natural world to question the dichotomy of being apart from nature versus being an integral part of it. Through thought-provoking artworks, the exhibition examines the consequences of perceiving ourselves as separate from nature, leading to exploitation and abuse, versus recognising our interconnectedness and the reciprocal relationship between humanity and the environment.

The overarching idea behind the exhibition is to examine how individuals experience landscapes emotionally and the subsequent impact of these experiences on their perceptions, attitudes, and actions towards nature. By showcasing a range of artistic expressions, Emotional Landscapes II aims to create a space where viewers can explore and reflect upon their own emotional responses to the natural world, be it feelings of awe, serenity, fear, or detachment.

Ultimately, Emotional Landscapes II seeks to facilitate a meaningful and thought-provoking dialogue about our emotional connections to the natural world, the impact of human actions on the environment, and the potential for a harmonious and sustainable coexistence.

Join us for an Artists Talk on Sunday 11 May from 2 to 3pm. All welcome!

Join us for a free artist talk on the last day of the exhibition, in which Margaret, Manuel and Alan—three Canberra artists with diverse artistic approaches and a deep connection to Canberra and surrounds—share their thoughts and insights. During the talk, the artists will speak about their creative practices, unique perspectives and inspirations. Please come and be part of a meaningful dialogue about the arts, human actions and our emotional connection with landscape.

Join us for the opening event at ANCA Gallery Wednesday 2 April from 5.30pm

Looking Up and Looking Down is an exhibition of mixed media abstract paintings which arose from a period of studio sharing at the ANCA Dickson Campus.

Working intuitively, Eve and Lucy draw forth memoryscapes, inner thoughts and emotions related to the world around us. The artists are concerned with visual perception and pictorial framing in their approaches to painting. For Eve and Lucy, the window presents a conceptual dichotomy through which the painting subject can either be internalised or externalised—meaning the viewer’s vantage point is set from the ‘inside’ or the ‘outside’ of a window frame.

In our homes, windows provide a view of the outside world, allowing light in through a layer of glass which protects and shields us from the elements of the natural world. Windows can also be seen as imaginative portals which capture light, shadow, reflection and space. The protection provided by a glass window is precarious, we are offered a false sense of security by its materiality, which can be easily shattered.

What do we see when we gaze through a window? Through glass a multilayered image is created of the world outside, shadows and dappled light from trees and branches, the reflection of our own faces and the reflection of the inside of an enclosed room.

Light Window Weather Reduction

my inclement eye
has been broken wide open
as roused by a tungsten frame
cough: the paracetamol fever
sweats the merciful machine
as neem,
nitrogen,
scissors,
and showers
draught westwards
across the address
i had sketched on greased paper
he wrote:
apathy and opinions,
this brittle aggregate of extremes
will endlessly murmur in our art
are we enough?
(spoken as soil,
animated and listless,
itchy and restless)
my pupils stretch and wrestle
with the electric hum behind them
(i walk back to the window and close it to keep out the summer storm)

 Anonymous

Join us for the launch event at ANCA Gallery Wednesday 12 March from 5.30pm

Not quite square by Gayle Stockley

Not Quite Square by Gayle Stockley is an exhibition of non-objective, minimalist, geometric oil paintings and linear sculpture constructed with stretcher framing. It is the culmination of work developed over the last ten years. Gayle’s style evolved following a seven year period making relief sculpture using bushfire-blackened casuarina. The simple, linear, geometric composition of this sculpture then transferred to painting. Using oil paint, palette knife and collaged canvas-on-canvas Gayle often layers colours such as red under green creating a lively ‘almost black’ or applies one colour only in a sketchy manner without under-paint. Paintings are executed in a way where the marks of the maker are clearly visible in pencil grid-lines and imperfections from her manner of working. Gayle’s intention is for the aesthetics of colour, line, form and the play between positive and negative shapes to be the subject of her work. She sees beauty in colours and simple geometric form in nature and has drawn inspiration from Constantin Brancusi’s endless column sculptures, minimalist painters Ellsworth Kelly and Imi Knoebel and geometry in primitive art.

“This body of work is about beauty in geometry and simplicity. By using the basic elements of painting—colour, line and form—I endeavour to make an ‘object’ that visually communicates interest simply by the colours chosen, the positive and negative spaces created by the composition, use of collage and the manner in which it is made.”

Gayle Stockley has lived and studied in Perth, Melbourne and Canberra, moving to Wamboin in 1994 where she has a studio. Her minimalist painting style and practice evolved after a seven year period making relief sculpture and since 2015 has focused on simple geometric form, colour, line, grids and canvas collage on canvas.

Pattern/colour/space/form

Join us for the opening event Wednesday 19 February from 5.30pm

Al Munro’s work spans painting, drawing and textile media to explore the connections of colour and pattern to fine art, craft and design and their links to geometry. Her work is informed by the characteristics and structures of textiles — warp and weft, folding and pleating and textile pattern systems. The artist uses these properties to explore abstraction in painting.

As the viewer moves around each work, areas of pattern are either revealed or hidden allowing the experience of the pattern, colours and forms to change according to the viewer’s position. ‘Folds’ further activate the experience, while collaged patterns disturb the perception of space within each composition.

Al Munro is an Australian artist working on Ngunnawal/Ngambri land in Canberra. She regularly exhibits within Australia and overseas, most recently presenting a solo show at the MATDOT Art Centre in Bangkok in December 2024. She holds a doctorate from the Australian National University School of Art.

Join us for the opening event on Wednesday 5 February at 5.30pm

Ash, Awe and Introspection
As part of ANCA’s support for emerging artists in the Canberra region, the ANCA Gallery awards an annual exhibition (EASS Award) to an ANU School of Art & Design graduate, or graduates, whose work demonstrates creative distinction. In December 2024 the ANCA prize was awarded to three art school graduates: Ira Gold, Tanya King and James O’Rourke. Ash, Awe and Introspection brings together the work of these three recent graduates for the first time, working across a variety of mediums including charcoal, oils and ceramics. Each artist presents their individual reflections under the broad thematic of the environment and the self. Ash, Awe and Introspection explores concepts of belonging, elemental forces of nature and interpersonal connection.

Artist statements:

Ira Gold: ‘Scorched-Earth explores my understanding of my home in Mparntwe, as an emerging First Nations artist of mixed heritage. My work is a response to the 2023 Northern Territory bushfires fuelled by Buffel grass.’

James O’Rourke: ‘The conflict between how we perceive ourselves and how we are perceived does not just apply interpersonally, but also within the self. Obfuscation of one's own emotions is common among the neurodiverse. This leads to a feeling that one’s true self is tantalisingly out of reach.’

Tanya King: ‘In these landscape paintings, I explore feelings of awe and impermanence. Mountains can evoke wonder and reverence combined with foreboding and fear. Their epic proportions can remind us of things greater than ourselves.’

The exhibition runs from 29 January to 16 February 2025 inclusive.