Lake Macquarie NSW is home to a thriving arts community supported by a range of dynamic and contemporary art venues across the city. Discover a vibrant, exciting and diverse program of exhibitions for 2026.
Dhumaan ngayin ngarrakalu kirraanan barayidin
We remember and respect the Ancestors who cared for and nurtured this Country.
Ngarrakalumba yuludaka bibayilin barayida baaduka
It is in their footsteps that we travel these lands and waters.
Lake Macquarie City Council dhumaan Awabakala ngarrakal yalawaa, yalawan, yalawanan.
Lake Macquarie City Council acknowledges the Awabakal people and Elders past, present and future.
* Information is correct at the time of printing. Dates and prices are subject to change
Presenting the work of four artists, each bringing a distinct voice, vision, and methodology to the moving image. Their practices could not be more varied, ranging from animation to abstract moving-image experiments, and from poetic meditations to cinematic, multilayered video tableaux. Together, the works form a constellation of approaches that highlight the diversity and vitality of contemporary screen-based practice.
You are invited to move between radically different artistic languages and sensibilities, experiencing the full spectrum of what moving image art can be, from the intimate and contemplative to the expansive and spectacular.
Offering not only a glimpse into the creative breadth of the four participating artists, but also a critical exploration of how immersive environments can transform the ways we encounter and engage with contemporary art.
Image: Kultura Collectiva, Theatre of Memories, 2025
FIRST CLASS 2025
21 FEBRUARY – 19 APRIL 2026
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event and Youth Market Day: Sunday 22 February
First Class is an established annual exhibition project celebrating the high calibre of Higher School Certificate work produced by students from the Hunter and Central Coast regions. The exhibition is selected from nominated HSC body of work submissions produced in the previous year and curated by independent arts industry professionals.
Image: First Class, installation view, 2024
CONFLUENCE
: ANNE GRAHAM, HENRY LEWIS, HILARIE MAIS AND NOT
21 FEBRUARY – 19 APRIL 2026
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event: Saturday 21 February, with Jayden Marriott opening
Anne Graham, Henry Lewis, Hilarie Mais and NOT present a stunning new exhibition called Confluence encompassing body of works which flow in unison. Through breath, rhyme and repetition these international artists map the geographical ravines of body and place. As audiences make their way through the works they will find a beautiful sense of synchrony and intrigue.
Confluence is a touring project that has been developed by Museum of Art and Culture, yapang. This project is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW. It will be showing at the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre from 26 April to 14 June 2026.
Image: Anne Graham returning river, 2023. Hilarie Mais her riddle, 2025. NOT rising tide (marea crescente), 2025. Henry Lewis 134c, 2025.
I'M WITH YOU, I ALWAYS HAVE BEEN: JAYDEN MARRIOTT
AIC SPACE: 21 FEBRUARY – 19 APRIL 2026
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event: Saturday 21 February, with Confluence opening
Influenced by Abstract Expressionism, Jayden Marriott is an early career artist from Warners Bay. Through the form of painting he invites the viewer into a world built around emotion and beliefs released through complex brushstrokes on canvas. Marriott seeks to blur the boundary between artist and viewer through the energy produced in his painterly works. This exhibition is presented in the Art in Our Community space as an opportunity for the artist to share his work, alongside First Class ’25, with a large regional gallery audience.
Image: Jayden Marriot portrait, 2025. Courtesy the artist.
AUTUMN
EXHIBITION: HUNTER TAFE STUDENTS
1 MARCH – 8 APRIL
Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima
Opening event: Sunday 1 March, 12-2pm
Celebrating the creativity and vision of Hunter TAFE students in an immersive format in the MAP mima projection cube. Works, which were originally created using traditional media, have been digitised, scaled to extraordinary proportions, and transformed into an enveloping experience for audiences.
The showcase highlights the breadth of emerging talent in the Lake Macquarie and Hunter region and explores the possibilities of reimagining student artworks in new formats.
MAP mima is proud to be showing this exhibition and is committed to nurturing and supporting the next generation of artists, offering a platform that elevates their practice while fostering a culture of inclusivity and artistic stewardship.
Image: Student Artwork, Hunter TAFE, 2025
AUTUMN COMMISSION – PAUL MOSIG AND RACHEL PEACHEY
13 MARCH – 26 APRIL
Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima
Opening event: Saturday 14 March, 12-2pm
For the Autumn 2026 Commission, MAP mima presents a newly created work by collaborative artists Paul Mosig and Rachel Peachey. Known for their cinematic and immersive practice, Mosig and Peachey craft experiences that blur the boundaries between film, installation, and expanded moving image.
Their commission for MAP mima transforms the 360-degree Cube into a shifting environment of sound and vision, enveloping audiences in layered imagery and atmospheric soundscapes. Drawing on their interest in the everyday, the natural world, and the intersections of human experience with technology, the work invites viewers into a world that feels both intimate and expansive.
Image: Paul Mosig and Rachel Peachey, Gloaming, 2025
30 YEARS OF HEAR THE ART
25 APRIL – 24 MAY
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event: Saturday 26 April, with Salote Tawale opening
This exhibition will explore Richard Tipping’s story and culture that is deeply entwined with MAC yapang via his works in the MAC yapang art collection and the MAC yapang Sculpture Park. This exhibition will celebrate 30 years of HEAR THE ART, created and installed at the Park in 1996.
Image: Richard Tipping, HEAR THE ART, MAC yapang sculpture park, 2024. Courtesy MAC yapang
THE TIDE CONTINUES: SALOTE TAWALE
26 APRIL – 19 JULY
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event: Saturday 26 April, with Richard Tipping opening
Australian-Fijian artist Salote Tawale works across performance, moving image, painting and installation. Her work is centred around her research into cultural identity and internal conflict of being from mixed heritage and the challenges that occur when in a diasporic existence. Tawale has created new works in response to Lake Macquarie after a 2025 twoweek residency, researching the surrounding waterways and mangroves, introductions of colonial interceptions on the surrounding natural landscape.
Tawale completed an undergraduate degree in Media Arts at RMIT University and a Masters of Fine Art at Sydney College of the Arts. Her works have been exhibited within Australia and internationally including at ParaSite Gallery, Hong Kong; St Pauls Gallery, Auckland; Indonesian Contemporary Art Network Yogyakarta; and Campbelltown Art Centre, Sydney.
In 2017 Tawale was awarded the inaugural Arts NSW Visual Artists Fellowship to record oral histories and connect to artists in the Fiji Islands, travel to major art events in Europe, including the Venice Biennale and Documenta, and forge connections with the Institute of International Visual Arts and Stuart Hall Library in the UK. Tawale is the current recipient of a six-month Australia Council for the Arts residency hosted by ACME studios in London.
Beyond the waves, curated by acclaimed interdisciplinary artist Salote Tawale, brings together a selection of video work by Pacific Islander artists that challenge, connect, and reimagine identity across oceans and generations.
The works weave together stories of place, memory, and belonging. They speak in many voices - each rooted in the Pacific yet reaching beyond its shores - and together form a resonant chorus that embodies the vitality and breadth of Pacific Islander creative expression today.
This video program is both a tribute to Pacific heritage and an invitation to engage with the dynamic narratives shaping the region’s past, present and future.
Image: Salote Tawale, ‘I get so emotional (karaoke version),’ 2006
YOUNG DOBELL COMPETITION 2026
30 MAY – 19 JULY
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event and award announcement: Sunday 31 May
The Young Dobell Art Competition runs as part of the Dobell Festival and is a celebration of young Australian talent – inviting artists between the ages of 5 and 18 to submit a portrait of ‘someone who is special to them and plays a significant role in their life’ or a landscape of a ‘special Lake Macquarie location’.
Schools and individuals across the wider Hunter and Central Coast regions are invited to participate and finalists will be on view at MAC yapang as part of the month-long Dobell Festival.
Image: Young Dobell Competition 2025
the edge of the world: BRONTË
NAYLOR, ARNAR GÚSTAFSSON, ELÍN C. H. RAMETTE
5 JUNE – 2 AUGUST
Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima
Opening event: Friday 5 June, 5-7pm
Created through an intercontinental collaboration, the edge of the world is an immersive video installation by Brontë Naylor (Newcastle, AUS), Arnar Gústafsson, and Elín C. H. Ramette (Seyðisfjörður, IS). The work brings together 16mm film, soundscapes, and visual experimentation to explore the social, natural, and mythological landscapes of Australia and Iceland.
At its centre is the question of what it means to exist at the edge, whether a desert horizon, a windswept shoreline, or a mountain ridge. Australia and Iceland, both islands on the periphery, act as mirrors to one another, revealing shared concerns of ecological fragility, shifting time, and non-human perspectives.
Image: Brontë Naylor, Edge of the World, 2025
CURRENT CONNECTIONS: DAVID COLLINS, SALLY STOKES,
BELINDA STREET, LEAH THIESSEN AND ANA YOUNG
25 JULY – 20 SEPTEMBER
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event: Saturday 25 July, with Catherine McGuiness exhibition
Artists David Collins, Sally Stokes, Belinda Street, Leah Thiessen and Ana Young share their ongoing interpretation and engagement with the Australian landscape. Whilst all the artists adopt different approaches, they share a common link: the practice of plein air investigation and immediate response to place. For this exhibition the artists have embarked on several residency programs over the years to share their different approaches to interpreting the landscape.
Image: Sally Stokes studio portrait, 2025. Courtesy the artist.
NIGHT BLOSSOM: STUDIO A –CATHERINE MCGUINESS
25 JULY – 20 SEPTEMBER
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening event: Saturday 25 July, with Current Connections exhibition
Night Blossom is the first solo exhibition by Catherine McGuiness, initially presented at Mosman Art Gallery. Catherine’s vibrant works glow like jewels in the night. A collection of large-scale paintings, works on paper and a dinner table that perpetually awaits for guests to arrive.
This festive exhibition is an invitation into aspects of Catherine’s world. It's a generous offering to her community and a much welcomed space of wonder.
Catherine McGuiness is enthusiastic and caring and her magical energy is infectious to anyone who meets her, especially those on a dance floor. It's clear to see these same attributes infuse in her art practice. There is an unselfconscious power to her work that seems to mimic these personality traits.
Studio A is a Sydney based arts company that makes great art and specifically provides professional development to artists with intellectual disability. Through Studio A, artists exhibite and sell their work, receiving commissions for new work and licensing their intellectual property. Studio A is driven to ensure artists with intellectual disability have a voice in contemporary Australian culture and to provide employment to these artists via the income they receive when their art and services are sold.
Image: Catherine McGuiness, Mossman Art Gallery, 2024.
Photographer: Cassandra Hannagan. Night Blossom is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW
STARGAZING: JAX NORTH AND NADEENA DIXON
7 AUGUST – 30 AUGUST
Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima
Opening event: Saturday 8 August, 12-2pm
Stargazing brings together artists Jax North and Nadeena Dixon in a collaborative work that looks to the night sky as both inspiration and guide. Drawing on cultural knowledge, storytelling, and contemporary artistic practice, the project explores the ways stargazing connects us to place, ancestry, and shared experience.
Through an immersive interplay of sound, image, and narrative, North and Dixon invite audiences to pause and reflect on the cosmos as a site of wonder and knowledge. The work positions the act of looking upward not only as an encounter with the universe, but also as a way of grounding ourselves within cultural memory and continuity.
Image: Ryan Wild, You are a Universe, 2025
NEURODIVERSE: NSW REGIONAL ARTISTS
4 SEPTEMBER – 20 SEPTEMBER
Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima
Opening event: Saturday 5 September, 12-2pm
Bringing together neurodivergent artists from across regional NSW, Neurodiverse is an immersive artwork for MAP mima’s 360-degree projection cube. The program provides a space for artists with lived experience of neurodiversity—including those on the autism spectrum, and artists with ADHD, dyslexia, and other neurodivergent experiences, to collaborate and share their practice.
Supported to explore their perspectives and artistic processes in a professional and inclusive environment, Neurodiverse offers an opportunity to experience creative work shaped by diverse ways of thinking and making.
Image: MAP mima, Brutalist Cityscape, 2025
OF THIS EARTH – TRANSFORMING
CULTURE AND COUNTRY THROUGH
FIRST NATIONS CERAMICS
26 SEPTEMBER – 29 NOVEMBER
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
'Of This Earth celebrates remarkable ceramics by contemporary First Nations artists from across Australia. Reflecting cultural and artistic expressions, these works are creative, bright and fun while using exciting and innovative techniques in engaging ways.' - Tina Baum and Grace Currey.
Transforming culture and Country through First Nations ceramics, Of This Earth highlights cultural continuity and contemporary artistic expression through works of art drawn from the National Collection. The exhibition features over thirty key works of art by twenty-eight significant Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists; including Thancoupie (Dhaynagwidh/Thaynakwith people), Billy Bain (Dharug people), Nicole Foreshew (Wiradjuri people) and Janet Fieldhouse (Kalaw Lagaw Ya/Meriam Mir peoples). Showcasing the diverse techniques, narratives, and innovations of this constant and evolving medium, Of This Earth celebrates the breadth of First Nations ceramic practice across Australia.
Archaeological evidence reveals the cultural practice First Nations people had with clay centuries ago, with this exhibition highlighting the contemporary affinity artists have to this medium today. These works continue to share stories about culture, Country, Community, ceremony, Ancestors, everyday life and imagination.
Of This Earth: Transforming culture and Country through First Nations ceramics is a National Gallery Touring Exhibition supported by the Australian Government through Visions of Australia.
Curators: Tina Baum, Gulumirrgin (Larrakia)/Wardaman/Karajarri peoples, Senior Curator, First Nations Art and Grace Currey, Barkindji/Kunja peoples, Curatorial Assistant, First Nations Art.
Clapstick Meditation is an immersive sound and visual environment that invites audiences into a sacred space shaped by rhythm, pattern, and deep listening. The exhibition honours one of the world’s oldest instruments still in use today, the clapstick, while expanding its resonance into visual form through artworks that map rhythmic patterns into notation and design.
Adam Manning is a rhythmist, artist, composer and producer who was born on Awabakal/ Worimi Country and is a Kamilaroi descendant from the area of Northern New South Wales and Southern Queensland. His rhythmic expressions sit at the centre of his compositions and artworks, where sound and visual pattern connect with the natural frequency, the heartbeat, of Ngaya Barray (Mother Earth).
Image: Adam Manning, 2023. Courtesy of the artist
THE AUSTRALIAN NETWORK OF ART AND TECHNOLOGY + MAP MIMA ARTIST RESIDENCY
25 SEPTEMBER – 29 NOVEMBER
Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima
Opening event: Saturday 26 September, 12-2pm
Pairing an artist with a scientist, The ANAT (Australian Network for Art in Technology) + MAP mima Artist Residency seeks to develop new work at the intersection of art, technology, and research. Hosted at MAP mima, the residency provides time, space, and resources for deep collaboration, fostering projects that bring together creative imagination and scientific inquiry.
Through this partnership, artists are invited to engage with scientific methodologies while scientists are encouraged to explore the speculative and experimental potential of artistic practice. The outcome is not only the creation of new work for MAP mima’s immersive 360-degree projection cube, but also the development of fresh dialogues between disciplines.
Image: MAP mima, Abstract Futurescape, 2025
OFF THE WALL
5 DECEMBER – 7 FEBRUARY 2027
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Opening: Friday 4 December, with Lottie Consalvo opening
Now in its fourth year, Off the Wall is a celebration of the wealth of artistic talent in the Lake Macquarie and Hunter regions.
Developed with the focus of supporting Lake Macquarie’s diverse creative community, Off the Wall establishes an opportunity for artists to display and sell work, while building involvement, representation, and connection. All Artworks are available to purchase and take home directly off the wall.
M O N U M E N T:
LOTTIE CONSALVO
5 DECEMBER – 7 FEBRUARY 2027
Museum of Art and Culture, yapang
Friday 4 December, with Off the Wall opening
Lottie Consalvo traverses painting, performance, video and sculpture. Her work explores psychological shifts and ideas surrounding desire, longing and the ungraspable.
M O N U M E N T is a presentation of new, large-scale paintings and sculptures by Consalvo as an important recognition of her recent works produced in monumental form. Consalvo questioning the mind’s expansiveness as a greater force than the physical world and encourages questions of what underscores an individual's experience of reality.
In 2015, Consalvo completed a residency with Marina Abramovic as part of Kaldor Public Art Projects 30 in Sydney, and an exhibition at Hamburg’s Millerntor Gallery #5. In 2018, she held her first solo museum exhibition at Heide Museum of Modern Art in Victoria. The following year, she showcased her Horizon video works at Casula Powerhouse, and had a major exhibition at Maitland Regional Art Gallery. Consalvo’s work has been exhibited internationally—including in Germany, Mexico, England, America and New Zealand—and is held in various esteemed collections such as Artbank, Newcastle Art Gallery, Maitland Regional Art Gallery, Gippsland Regional Art Gallery, Macquarie University, Newcastle University, Museum of Art and Culture, yapang, and The Stevenson Collection.
Image: Lottie Consalvo, 2025. Courtesy the artist.
MAP MIMA SUMMER COMMISSION 2026
4 DECEMBER 2026 – 21 FEBRUARY 2027
Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima
Opening event: Saturday 5 December, 12-2pm
The Summer Commission at MAP mima is an annual invitation to an artist or collective to create a new work for the 360-degree projection cube, responding with new perspectives and bold experimentation. Conceived as a platform for innovation, the commission encourages artists to expand their practice within an immersive environment, transforming the pavilion’s interior walls into a dynamic canvas of light, sound, and movement.
Image: Joshua Ingle, Roko, Summer Commission 2024
BECOME A LAKE MAC ARTS MEMBER
Be part of Lake Mac’s creative heartbeat
Celebrate art, music, and performance. Connect with others who share your passion and enjoy exclusive perks all year round.
MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS:
• Two free tickets to any Lake Mac Arts event
• 10% discount on events, programs and workshops
• 10% discount at Shop MAC (5% discount on books)
• Free wine tasting and other special offers at Ernest Hill Wines
• Invitations to exhibition openings, curator talks, and special events
• Free entry to the Art Gallery of NSW with your membership card ARTS.LAKEMAC.COM.AU/MEMBERSHIP
10am–5pm Tuesday – Friday, 10am–2pm Saturday and Sunday
Developed in conjunction with the West Wallsend District Heritage Group, the exhibition presents the story of the region through enticing and immersive experiences and, objects portraying the life and times of this unique township.
Discover the enduring cultural legacy of the local Awabakal people, and the individuals and communities who helped shape the district. The exhibition is supported by a ‘virtual underground’, the Hunter’s first virtual reality experience of an underground coal mine, and a hands-on ‘Play Museum’.
A self-guided historical walking tour of West Wallsend is available at the library museum. Volunteer guided tours run twice weekly, 11am Wednesday and Saturday. Bookings essential.
MAX DUPAIN: ART AND WAR
Rathmines Heritage Centre within the Rathmines Theatre
Open for tours by appointment only, to arrange contact: history@lakemac.nsw.gov.au
See the second world war through an artist’s eyes. Max Dupain photographed RAAF Rathmines and the Australian experience of the second world war while serving as a camouflage officer. Discover Dupain’s little known wartime work in this original Rathmines Heritage Centre exhibition.
LAUNCHPAD@ LAKE MAC LIBRARIES
10am–2pm Monday – Friday, 9am–12pm Saturday
Discover emerging and passionate local artists through the Launchpad@Lake Mac Libraries is an exhibition program, which invites exhibitions from community artists of all age ranges and levels of experience to exhibit across six of Lake Mac Libraries venues.
Image: Westy: We Built This History
Events and Festivals
LAKE MAC OPEN STUDIOS
7-8 November
1-30 June
The Lake Macquarie Dobell Festival is a month-long celebration of art inspired by Sir William Dobell, renowned for his passion and creative innovation. Enjoy workshops, talks and exhibitions that explore his life, work and lasting influence.
MEET THE MAKERS
– ARTISAN FAIR
Saturday 13 June
Meet the Makers is a full-day celebration of creativity at MAC yapang. Artists from across Lake Macquarie will showcase and demonstrate their craft, from painting and drawing to textiles, glass, ceramics, and more. Explore the creative process, meet the makers, and take home unique artworks.
Uncover Lake Macquarie’s rich history at this heritage festival. Join authors, historians, artists and community voices for a vibrant and engaging program of talks, exhibitions, performances, tours and workshops.
Step inside local studios for a weekend of creativity. Meet artists, discover their process and enjoy a rare behind-the-scenes experience. It’s the perfect chance to find unique, handcrafted gifts for Christmas or to add to your own personal art collection.
Image: Meet the Makers - Artisan Fair
Public Art
CREATIVE LAKE TRAIL
With over 20 amazing sculptures by locally and internationally celebrated artists, the Creative Lake Trail brings the art outside, transforming the northern shores of the lake into an open-air gallery. Explore these amazing artworks by foot or by bike on the 8km long accessible shared pathway, connecting Eleebana to MAC yapang.
FERNLEIGH
AWABAKAL SHARED TRACK
The FAST, as it is known, at Belmont Lagoon includes a series of public artworks, including the Awabakal Campsite, bronze fish totems and moon viewing platform, express connection to Country and the area’s cultural significance.
MAC YAPANG SCULPTURE PARK
Nestled in the leafy lakeside ground of the Museum of Art and Culture, yapang, the Sculpture Park is home to more than 20 works by artists with local and national acclaim.
MULTI-ARTS PAVILION, MIMA
On the lakeside shores in Speers Point Park, this innovative digital art and performance space is surrounded by public artworks. While inside you will find a 360° projection, outside is where this immersive art space truly shines – the interactive Catenary and Mima by Hiromi Tango light up the pavilion at night, while Sanne Mestrom's Lady of Lake sculpture, the Morse code Acknowledgement of Country built into the North Wall, and Adam Manning's interactive soundscape allows visitors to become immersed in the building during the day.
WANGI WANGI OWLS
Wangi Wangi, meaning “place of many owls” in Awabakal language, features larger-thanlife owl sculptures and a public art trail. The owl outside Wangi Creative Hub was painted by local Nikinpa Aboriginal artists, with support from Helene Ruma. Wangi Wangi is also home to the blue plaque and state heritage-listed Dobell House, once the residence and studio of multiple Archibald Prize-winning artist Sir William Dobell.
Image: Creative Lake Trail
Image: Sanné Mestrom Lady of the lake, MAP mima
Our Partners
Lake Mac Arts and its programs are supported by Lake Macquarie City Council and key funding partners. Lake Macquarie City Council is committed to the development of creative excellence.
BECOME A LAKE MAC ARTS MEMBER
Be part of Lake Mac’s creative heartbeat
Celebrate art, music, and performance. Connect with others who share your passion and enjoy exclusive perks all year round.
MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS:
• Two free tickets to any Lake Mac Arts event
• 10% discount on events, programs and workshops
• 10% discount at Shop MAC (5% discount on books)
• Free wine tasting and other special offers at Ernest Hill Wines
• Invitations to exhibition openings, curator talks, and special events
• Free entry to the Art Gallery of NSW with your membership card
