Southern Highlands artist Ben Quilty has won the Archibald Prize, Prudential Eye Award and the Doug Moran National Portrait Prize, but establishing his region's first professional art gallery could be his greatest achievement to date.
The Retford Park Southern Highlands Regional Gallery named Ngununggula opens to the public today, one day after New South Wales' 108-day lockdown ended and half a decade after he started working on the project.
"It's museum-standard and will attract shows from around the world.
"It's a place to aspire to."
Part of being able to attract touring art shows is providing a space that can be carefully controlled for light, sound and temperature.
Mr Quilty said Bowral will now be able to secure shows that have historically bypassed the Southern Highlands.
"They go to Goulburn, Canberra or west or east and they never stop here — now those trucks will stop here in the middle of east Bowral."
Gallery named after Aboriginal welcome
Mr Quilty said by naming the centre Ngununggula, it will give a voice to the local Indigenous community.
"It means it belongs to the people in Gundungurra [language]," local elder Aunty Val Mulcahy said.
"It's very important to pass on language because we're the first people.
The gallery is at Retford Park, the former residence of philanthropist and prominent newspaper publisher James Fairfax.
First exhibition by renowned Shoalhaven photographer
Tamara Dean is the first artist to be featured in the new regional gallery.
She said it is rare to be given such a large space to fill and such a broad brief.
"It's an incredible honour to be the first artist to have a solo show here but I'm pretty happy with how it's come together.
"It still feels cosy while being expansive."
Ms Dean's exhibition is called High Jinks in the Hydrangeas and occupies multiple rooms with specially curated scents and sounds to match her photographs and sculptures.
"I create installations where there's other scents involved."
Gallery director Megan Monte said it was a deliberate choice to feature Ms Dean in Ngununggula's first exhibition.
"Tamara's show sets the scene for what we're doing, which is a merging of contemporary practices, local ideas and landscapes and high technology displays.
"We want to give audiences an experience of different art mediums and ideas."
