The Best Regional Art Galleries in Australia

All across the country in regional cities and towns beyond the state capitals, art galleries are thriving – providing travellers with the perfect starting point for exploring a new region.

The $60.5 million HOTA Gallery is Australia’s largest public gallery outside a capital city, spanning six levels and more than 2000 square metres of exhibition space. Housed in Queensland’s sun-soaked Gold Coast, it is home to the $32 million City Collection, composed of more than 4400 artworks including those by Australian art royalty like Ben Quilty and Tracey Moffatt and one of the largest collections of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art in regional Australia.

We can find similar stories all across Australia as knockout art galleries in cities and towns outside the state capitals are becoming increasingly dynamic destinations in and of themselves. And despite the enormous challenges posed by the pandemic, momentum is only building in the regional arts space with a suite of major renovations and openings planned for 2021 and beyond. Also in Queensland is the $31.5 million reimagining of Rockhampton Art Gallery within a vibrant new cultural precinct. Meanwhile, in NSW, state-of-the-art Ngunungulla, the first regional art gallery in the Southern Highlands, takes shape on a historic dairy site. In Victoria, the Shepparton Art Museum (SAM) is housed in a bold new building and galleries the country over are getting sleek multimillion dollar makeovers: from Grafton Regional Gallery, in NSW’s famous jacaranda town, to Orange Regional Gallery in the state’s Central West. Plans are afoot, too, for major expansions at Newcastle Art Gallery – Australia’s first purpose-built regional gallery.

Another great drawcard of regional galleries is that they put their First Nations communities at the heart of what they do. “We are part of the oldest living civilisation in the world; this makes it imperative to support and learn about culture and country," says Dr Joanne Baitz, director of Bunbury Regional Art Gallery (BRAG) in Western Australia’s South West. Housed in an iconic pink convent building dating back to 1897, fundamental to its work is its everyday engagement with Noongar curators, artists and arts professionals to educate and to promote Indigenous art in order to fully represent all voices in the region. “We live on this land, we need to know its stories, to understand how to live and work together for the benefit of all," Baitz says. “Art is empowering and educational and a means of addressing difficult issues. It is a great way of unearthing hidden histories."

HOTA (Home of the Arts) is the Gold Coast’s vibrant cultural precinct.

Keen for more? Plot your course around Australia’s thriving regional cities and centres using their art galleries as your most cultured of guides.

Bendigo Art Gallery, Vic

Bendigo Art Gallery is one of the country’s best regional galleries, and has carved a niche for itself with blockbuster fashion and design exhibitions including Marilyn Monroe and Marimekko: Design Icon 1951-2018.

Established in 1887, Bendigo Art Gallery is also one of the oldest and largest regional galleries in the country and its extensive and varied collection holds work that ranges from the 19th century to the present day, including an impressive array of contemporary art by names such as Patricia Piccinini, Bill Henson and Dale Frank.

While in town, explore the many layers the Victorian Goldfields city has to offer by way of art, history and food (in 2019 Bendigo was designated a UNESCO City of Gastronomy).

Broken Hill Regional Art Gallery, NSW

Founded in 1904, the Broken Hill Regional Art Gallery (BHRAG) is the oldest regional gallery in NSW. And just as compelling as the artwork it displays is the building it’s housed in: “Operating from 1885 to 1985, Sully’s Emporium was the longest surviving commercial business in Broken Hill providing much of the heavy machinery and equipment for the development and exploration of Broken Hill’s mineral fields," says gallery and museum manager Tara Callaghan. Today the gallery has a permanent collection worth close to $10 million including works by modern masters like Margaret Preston and Arthur Streeton, contemporary artists such as Elisabeth Cummings and Abdul-Rahman Abdullah, and a fantastic collection of works by leading Indigenous artists including Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri.

Its annual program includes exhibitions by local artists, touring shows like the Archibald and two prestigious prizes: the Pro Hart Outback Art Prize and the Maari Ma Indigenous Art Awards (MMIAA).

Sully’s Emporium is a Broken Hill landmark.

Tweed Regional Gallery & Margaret Olley Art Centre, Murwillumbah, NSW

Murwillumbah, located in a green caldera in North Coast NSW’s creative Tweed area, is home to one of the country’s best regional galleries. The architecturally award-winning Tweed Regional Gallery & Margaret Olley Art Centre is set scenically on a hillside outside of town overlooking Wollumbin (Mt Warning). “We’ve got a beautiful building – the setting is extraordinary, the landscape really is amazing," says director Susi Muddiman OAM on one of the many reasons this spot is such a hot destination. Added to that, the diversity of programming across several distinct spaces, including the Margaret Olley Art Centre in tribute to the celebrated painter who attended primary school in Murwillumbah, which includes areas that have been recreated from her famous Paddington (Sydney) home studio.

Griffith Regional Art Gallery, NSW

Another stop on the Archibald Prize 2020 regional tour, Griffith Regional Art Gallery is housed in a distinctive pink Art Deco building, the refurbished Griffith Soldiers Memorial Hall Complex, built in the 1930s in a city designed by Walter Burley Griffin as part of the ambitious Murrumbidgee Irrigation scheme and renowned for its Italian heritage. A small but lovely space with 4.2-metre-high ceilings and natural timber floors of cypress and tallowwood, the gallery is home to two permanent collections, the National Contemporary Jewellery Award Collection and a Couture Collection representing the life’s work of fashion designers Ross Weymouth and John Claringbold. Its ‘Small Goods’ gift shop offers a range of handcrafted and artisan products, made by artists and craftspeople from the region and beyond.

Geelong Gallery, Vic

In 2021, one of Australia’s oldest regional galleries, Geelong Gallery presented the first comprehensive survey of the career to date of one of its homegrown talents – internationally renowned and Melbourne-based street artist RONE. As well as charting his practice from early stencil works through to the complete transformation of abandoned spaces, RONE in Geelong saw the artist transform a room within Geelong Gallery in response to the architecture and history of the building, and the gallery’s collection. “Throughout its 125-year history Geelong Gallery has always supported the art and artists of its time.

There is an enormous sense of pride in celebrating Tyrone (RONE) and his achievements over the past 20 years," says gallery director Jason Smith of this milestone. “Artists inspire their peers and the generations of artists who come after them." And it’s a source of great pride for RONE himself: “It’s still surreal for me that I’m working with Geelong Gallery. Growing up in Geelong and studying across the park at the Gordon TAFE and walking past [it] almost every day… It was always this institutional icon, a level of art that seemed at such a distance from myself even as a creative person," he says. “I just didn’t imagine I would be accepted into such a space at such a level. It still feels like I’m intruding. It’s a huge honour that my work has been accepted into the collection of the Geelong Gallery. And further, that the Gallery has given me the opportunity to reimagine and interpret the pristine space for my show. I hope this inspires and encourages other artists, Geelong artists, to create beyond the traditional gallery offering."

Shepparton Art Museum (SAM), Vic

Set on the picturesque Victoria Park Lake, the new $50 million SAM building by Melbourne-based, world-leading design practice Denton Corker Marshall is a striking cube-like form rendered in different metallic finishes that will feature five storeys complete with a rooftop viewing deck. It has become the home of the most significant collection of historic and contemporary Australian ceramics in regional Australia, which includes objects made by the first convict potters and ceramics by Merric Boyd, one of Australia’s earliest studio potters.

Bundaberg Regional Art Gallery (BRAG), Qld

Quite the eye-catcher in the centre of this elegant regional city in the heart of Queensland’s sugar-growing country, Bundaberg Regional Art Gallery is another building with a storied history. It started life as Customs House in 1902 before serving as a bank for 57 years; today one of its concrete bank vaults is used as an installation space.

Benalla Art Gallery, Vic

Right in the mix of Victoria’s bushranger country sits Benalla Art Gallery : a striking modernist building overlooking the small city’s lake and botanical gardens. Its permanent collection is an impressive mix of Australian art including a strong representation of the Heidelberg School with works by Arthur Streeton and Frederick McCubbin, and a range of traditional and contemporary Indigenous art including works by leading artists such as Emily Kame Kngwarreye and Long Jack Phillipus Tjakamarra. The gallery also has a great café, Munro and Sargeant – named for the building’s architects – and is a creative hub in the area with its artist talks, workshops and dynamic exhibition program.

Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery (QVMAG), Launceston, Tas

Launceston’s QVMAG is set across two sites: the 1870s-era railway workshop at Inveresk and the 1891 Royal Park Art Gallery building on Wellington Street. Serving as both the city’s creative pulse and gateway to its local history and character, it’s renowned for its collections of Australian colonial art, decorative arts, Tasmanian history and natural science – as well as an excellent gift shop featuring plenty of covetable Tassie design.

QVMAG at Royal Park — Inside one of two QVMAG sites… the 1891 Royal Park Art Gallery building on Wellington Street.

Geraldton Regional Art Gallery (GRAG), WA

Geraldton Regional Art Gallery serves up arts and culture to WA’s Mid West in a turn-of-the-century Town Hall building. Its stellar collection contains works by the likes of renowned contemporary artist Tracey Moffatt and Badimaya artist Julie Dowling, and sketches of local life by Western Australian artist Elizabeth Durack. The seaside city of Geraldton itself is fast becoming a trendy beach escape so wander the galleries, street art and cafes of the centre before hitting nearby Champion Beach.

Cairns Art Gallery, Qld

Set in a beautiful restored 1936 government building, one of Cairns’ few remaining heritage buildings complete with original terrazzo floor and stained-glass windows, Cairns Art Gallery is one of the largest public galleries in regional Queensland. It presents a contemporary range of exhibitions and interprets the unique history and living cultures of Far North Queensland, and its place in the world’s tropic zone.

Cairns Regional Art Gallery — The Cairns Art Gallery is housed within one of the city’s few remaining heritage buildings.

Araluen Arts Centre, Alice Springs, NT

One of Australia’s most remote regional galleries, surrounded on all sides by deserts, the Araluen is the visual art and performance hub of Central Australia and somewhere that is truly of its place. Its vast collection reflects the vitality and diversity of works from the region, including pieces by renowned watercolourist Albert Namatjira. At the heart of Alice Springs’ cultural scene, the centre also hosts the nationally significant Desert Mob exhibition, which presents contemporary Indigenous art from around 30 remote arts centres throughout the NT, SA and WA; as well as the quirky Alice Springs Beanie Festival, held in June.

Port Pirie Regional Art Gallery, SA

The old seaport town of Port Pirie , on the shores of the Spencer Gulf, is the gateway to the Flinders Ranges and South Australia’s outback. Its regional gallery, which began life in the old baggage room of the closed local railway station before moving into its dedicated gallery home in 1994, sits within sight of the Southern Flinders Ranges. And so it follows that its collection centres on artists – local, state and national – who have been inspired by the landscape here including Hans Heysen and Lawrence Daws.

Port Pririe Gallery — Port Pirie Regional Art Gallery is a cultural pit stop in the old seaport town of Port Pirie.

Art Gallery of Ballarat, Vic

Established in 1884, the Art Gallery of Ballarat is one of the oldest purpose-built galleries in Australia. Today its heritage bones are complemented by contemporary extensions, creating a dynamic platform to curate its staggering collection made up of over 11,000 artworks. The gallery’s fabulous shop stocks items by some of Ballarat’s many makers. While in town, explore the creative eateries, such as modern Asian Moon & Mountain, that have opened in the past few years.

Bank Art Museum Moree (BAMM), NSW

Operating in a beautiful old candy-coloured bank building dating back to 1911, BAMM is a regional art institution with a distinctly contemporary edge; it currently holds the most significant collection of Aboriginal paintings in regional NSW. While in Moree, a progressive town in the state’s northern wheatbelt, don’t miss a dip in its famous artesian waters.

New England Regional Art Museum (NERAM), Armidale, NSW

The excellent NERAM boasts what could just be the most comprehensive overview of Australian art history in regional Australia. At the core of this is the Howard Hinton Collection, which NERAM was purpose-built to house in 1983, with more than 1000 significant works by artists including Arthur Streeton, Margaret Preston and Brett Whiteley. After your visit, sample New England hospitality at craft beer bar The Welder’s Dog or cocktail bar with a twist Charlie’s Last Stand.

New England Regional Art Museum, Armidale — NERAM houses an overview of Australian art history in regional Australia.

Hobart has quietly become our coolest capital, but the real wonder lies just beyond the city limits.

In the cool shade of Kunyani/ Mt Wellington, Hobart has earned a reputation. Home to culture-defining Dark MOFO, the city blends rugged, raw wilderness and rule-breaking galleries. But, step beyond the thrumming capital’s border and you’ll find a new perspective: historic towns, Jurassic-era cliffs and a UNESCO City of Gastronomy. With ALL Accor as your home away from home, fill your days with epicurean odysseys and wild scenery on the best day trips from Hobart.

Where to stay

Behind every good road trip is the perfect home base. Somewhere central to review your camera roll, make the most of Hobart’s dining scene and relax before setting off again.

For modern, Tasmanian-inspired design, book a stay at the Movenpick Hotel Hobart . Standing at the Salamanca Markets, look to the Hobart skyline and the award-winning hotel will catch your eye. As the third-tallest building in the CBD, the views across the harbour toward Antarctica are totally unique to your room. Here, end each day at the daily free chocolate hour (plus a free Movenpick ice cream for the little ones).

For a more budget-conscious option, head to the picture book, sandstone buildings of Macquarie Street. Nestled along the buzzing, historic streetscape, you’ll find Tasmania’s biggest hotel: the Ibis Styles . Return home each day to defrost in one of the hotel’s two saunas. Make use of the proximity to MONA, or take an easy stroll to the candy-coloured cottages of Battery Point between your adventures.

A stylish, Tasmanian-inspired bedroom at Mövenpick Hotel Hobart, your perfect base for relaxing after the best day trips from Hobart. — Elevate your Hobart stay with sleek style at Mövenpick.

1. Bruny Island

Craggy cliffs and tropical-hued, white sand beaches signal your arrival to Bruny Island/ Lunawanna-Alonnah.

Start your day trip at the island’s most iconic spot, the Neck Game Reserve. Scale the Trunganini steps to gaze out over the teensy stretch of land that juts through the sea connecting the two ends of the island.

Catch a rare glimpse of the white furred wallabies that call Bruny Island home at Adventure Bay. Then, for ocean-fresh oysters, pull into the drive-thru window at Get Shucked . Sample Bruny Island cheese at the cellar door before catching the ferry home with an esky full of local produce.

Bruny Island Neck is an isthmus of land connecting north and south Bruny Island. — Begin your adventure with a climb and a view. (Image: Elise Weaver)

2. Mount Wellington

At 1271 metres, Mount Wellington watches protectively over Hobart. Follow the winding road to climb through alpine forest and tufts of snow to reach the summit. Gaze down over Hobart and out to sea, or over your shoulder to the southwestern wilderness.

Reset your adrenaline with a mountain bike ride back down. Or, make like the locals and head into the mountain on foot. Try the hike to the Jurassic-period Organ Pipes which slips under the mountain’s magnificent dolerite cliffs (perfect for families thanks to the trail’s minimal incline).

For a view of Mount Wellington itself, hike nearby Cathedral Rock.

No matter where you are in Hobart you are never far away from the City's beloved mountain, Kunanyi / Mount Wellington — Climb through alpine forest to the summit. (Image: Paul Flemming)

2. Port Arthur

Constructed entirely by convicts, the manicured gardens and penal buildings of Port Arthur offer a day trip that practically hums with history.

The rugged, seagirt location was chosen for its difficult escape conditions. Now, you can cruise the coast below the towering, jagged cliffs of the Tasman National Park or wander the sloping fields of fragrant lavender.

Tickets to Port Arthur include a walking tour and harbour cruise. See the Isle of the Dead where 1000 men are buried in marked and unmarked graves. And Point Puer, Britain’s first prison for children.

The Port Arthur Historic Site is one of Australia's most important heritage sites and tourist destinations. Located on the scenic Turrakana / Tasman Peninsula in the south east of Tasmania, it offers a unique and essential experience for all visitors to the area. — Wander convict-built grounds and gardens. (Image: Dearna Bond)

3. Launceston

You’ll find Launceston at the confluence of three rivers after an easy 2.5-hour drive from Hobart. Launceston is a patchwork of old and new. Here, heritage streetscapes meet modern architecture.

Visit Cataract Gorge, the green, sun-dappled heart of the town and sacred meeting point for Tasmania’s indigenous communities. Pull up at roadside produce stalls that dot the Tamar Valley, or dine out. Launceston is, after all, a UNESCO City of Gastronomy.

Should the local wine scene persuade you, simply extend your time in Launceston at Peppers Silo (but definitely at least stop by the onsite restaurant, Grain of the Silo , for a farm fresh menu) or Mercure Launceston before heading back to Hobart.

Walk the sunlit paths of Cataract Gorge. (Image: Nick H Visuals)

4. Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary

Take a 35-minute drive from your hotel and you’ll find Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary . This social enterprise is run by a team of extremely passionate Tasmanians with a mission to look after critically endangered species who have found sanctuary here after facing extinction on the mainland.

Choose to wander the sanctuary at your own pace or join a guided tour (free with your ticket) to come face to face with Tassie’s most iconic species. Tasmanian Devils, wombats and echidnas are part of the free tour. You can book up close encounters with your favourite animals, too.

Bonorong is a Sanctuary for wildlife run by a passionate team of like-minded people. We're a social enterprise: a little business with a big heart. — Snap a cuddle-worthy encounter. (Image: Tourism Australia)

5. Richmond Village & Coal River Valley

Richmond is a town that belongs in a snow globe. Fifty colonial-era, Georgian buildings have been painstakingly restored and turned into cafes, cosy restaurants and galleries. Visit Richmond Gaol , said to be the home of a prisoner so vile he inspired Charles Dickens to pen Oliver Twist’s Fagin.

Then, follow the Coal River as it flows past grassy, duckling-dotted knolls and under the iconic Richmond Bridge, the oldest bridge in Australia. From the crest of the bridge, see the oldest Catholic Church in Australia. The river crawls past many cellar doors, perfect for a day of wine tasting.

Richmond is a picture-perfect town in the Coal River Valley wine region, offering a glimpse into early colonial life, one of the best day trips from Hobart. — Trace the river through history and wine country. (Image: Fin Matson)

Plan your trip to Hobart and beyond with ALL Accor at All.com .

The best regional art galleries in Australia