Bundanon has unveiled its first major exhibition for 2026, Sky, Earth, Water, featuring works by acclaimed Australian artist Rosalie Gascoigne (1917-1999), alongside significant new commissions by leading contemporary First Nations women artists Lorraine Connelly-Northey, Janet Fieldhouse and Glenda Nicholls. The exhibition is presented in the Art Museum until 14 June 2026.
Sky, Earth, Water explores Rosalie Gascoigne‘s deep connection to the material landscape, with over 20 key works on loan from major institutions including the Art Gallery of New South Wales, National Gallery of Australia, National Gallery of Victoria, Heide Museum of Modern Art, TarraWarra Museum of Art, and significant private collections.
Her poetic assemblages of salvaged found materials – such as discarded road signs, timber and domestic remnants – transform into radiant compositions evoking massed white clouds, expansive bodies of water, and weathered grey and golden wheat fields of the Monaro region of south-eastern New South Wales. This focused exhibition illuminates the evolution of Gascoigne‘s practice, from early arrangements and smaller experimental studies, through to some of her most iconic works.
Bundanon’s unique regional setting, encompassing rocky escarpments, bushland, river flats and agricultural lands on the mighty Bangli/Shoalhaven River system, provides a compelling framework for seeing Gascoigne’s work anew.
A pioneering figure in Australian contemporary art, Gascoigne developed her practice later in life, holding her debut exhibition in 1975 at the age of 57, and quickly rising to national prominence when she became the first woman to represent Australia at the Venice Biennale in 1982.
Created in response to Bundanon and the artists’ respective homelands, new commissions by Lorraine Connelly-Northey, Janet Fieldhouse and Glenda Nicholls draw on longstanding cultural knowledge and offer distinct perspectives on site-responsive art-making.
Waddi Waddi, Ngarrindjeri and Yorta Yorta artist and master weaver Glenda Nicholls presents a major woven installation, hand-dyed to reflect the rocky escarpments that inspired Arthur Boyd’s celebrated Shoalhaven painting series. Nicholls’ sister, Darlene Cunningham, has created large basket forms using a coil weaving technique, alongside smaller circular weavings representing the boulders and pebbles at the base of Bundanon’s Pulpit Rock. Working with techniques handed down from her mother and grandmothers, Nicholls’ practice is grounded in intergenerational knowledge sharing, reviving ancestral traditions and their connection to waterways, plants and grasses on her Country.
Inspired by the local birdlife at Bundanon, Meriam Mir (Torres Strait) ceramic artist Janet Fieldhouse presents a series of sculptural works in stoneware and clay, set into glass bases and adorned with delicate bird figures. Her new work, Non Functional Poo, is a playful nod to Bundanon’s wombat inhabitants and their distinctive cubic dung, reflecting her close observation of the natural world. Her hand-built forms draw on her matrilineal heritage, as well as European and First Peoples’ pottery practices from the Pacific and Americas.
Waradgerie artist Lorraine Connelly-Northey presents a major installation of large-scale bush bags, alongside bowls and digging sticks made from rustic steel mesh, iron and tin. Referencing the tools of traditional gatherers, the works form part of her ongoing cultural research and deep learning. Connelly-Northey’s practice offers a contemporary interpretation of significant First Nations cultural objects, informed by decades of focused engagement with traditional hunter-gatherer society.
Throughout 2026, the Boyd Collection Gallery presents a selection of works by Arthur Boyd (1920-1999) drawn from the Bundanon Collection, shown in dialogue with key paintings from the National Gallery of Australia as part of the Sharing the National Collection programs. Sky, Earth, Water highlights early explorations of the natural landscape by Arthur Boyd. As a teenager, Boyd lived on the Mornington Peninsula with his artist grandfather, Arthur Merric Boyd (senior), who was a respected landscape painter associated with the Heidelberg School. The young Boyd spent his days developing his technique outdoors and writing devotedly to his artist mother, Doris Boyd. This early, engagement with the natural world provided a starting point for Boyd’s practice and, much later, became a cornerstone in the founding of Bundanon.
Rachel Kent, CEO, Bundanon said: “Bundanon is delighted to present ‘Sky, Earth, Water’, celebrating the work of one of Australia’s most respected artists, Rosalie Gascoigne, alongside major new commissions by leading First Nations artists Lorraine Connelly-Northey, Janet Fieldhouse and Glenda Nicholls. We look forward to welcoming visitors to experience this compelling conversation across generations and cultures, reflecting the enduring role of landscape, memory and material in shaping artistic expression on Country, at Bundanon.”
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Artwork: Rosalie Gascoigne, Sky, Earth, Water, 2026, Bundanon. Photo: Zan Wimberley
