Queensland Art Gallery Annual Report

director’s overview / QUEENSLAND ART GALLERY ANNUAL REPORT 05/06 11 to the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI), Melbourne, for a ten-day showing in December. ‘Made for this World’ proved to be another successful exhibition for children, and included three major interactive works for kids by Yayoi Kusama, Cai Guo-Qiang and Olafur Eliasson. In February, a new Gallery travelling exhibition, ‘Queensland Live: Contemporary Art on Tour’, commenced an eight-venue tour. Featuring works by 11 of the state’s leading artists, the exhibition forms part of the regional Queensland opening celebrations program for GoMA. During the year the Foundation held a successful appeal for funds to purchase Charles Blackman’s 1952 painting City lights . Individual and corporate members of the Foundation generously supported this appeal, and I extend a warm thanks to all whose contribution ensured this significant painting entered our Australian art collection. I also take the opportunity to thank all Foundation members, as well as individual donors and sponsors, for their support of broader Gallery projects and acquisitions during the year. As the Gallery approaches the opening of the GoMA, APT5, and the refurbished Queensland Art Gallery, I thank Wayne Goss, Chair of the Board of Trustees, and the dedicated Board members. I also acknowledge the Gallery’s staff who continue to demonstrate dedication and commitment to providing the best possible experiences and services to our expanding audiences. Doug Hall, AM , Director DIRECTOR’S OVERVIEW During the year the Gallery’s curatorial team finalised the artists to be included in ‘The 5th Asia–Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art’ (APT5) — 37 individual artists and 2 multi-artist projects. With over 300 works of art to be featured across both the Queensland Art Gallery and the Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA), APT5 will be twice the scale of past Triennials — a suitably ambitious project for the inaugural exhibition of our two-site institution. The Triennial continues to distinguish itself from other international art events by its collecting focus. Reflecting the Gallery’s intensive acquisitions program in the area of contemporary Asian and Pacific art over the past decade, previously unseen Collection works will make up the majority of the exhibited works in APT5. Acquisitions made in this area during the reporting year included works by John Pule (Niue/New Zealand), Sima Urale (Samoa/New Zealand) and Yang Zhenzhong (China). As part of preparations for the event, several artists came to Brisbane to develop their projects for the Triennial. In July and August 2005, the Gallery hosted Japanese artist Tsuyoshi Ozawa; curator Lu Jie of China’s Long March Project; and Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, who has been commissioned to produce a major site-specific installation for the exhibition. Highlights of the exhibition program during the year included the Gallery’s concurrent presentation of two major Australian travelling exhibitions — ‘Margaret Preston: Art and Life’ from the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and ‘Grace Cossington Smith: A Retrospective Exhibition’ from the National Gallery of Australia. Audiences also enjoyed a survey of the work of leading Australian contemporary jeweller Barbara Heath, who has been practising in Brisbane for over two decades. From November 2005 to January 2006, two major exhibitions were presented under the auspices of new GoMA initiatives — the Australian Cinémathèque’s ‘Kiss of the Beast’, and the Children’s Art Centre’s ‘Made for this World: Contemporary Art and the Places We Build’. For ‘Kiss of the Beast’, the Gallery worked with South Bank Cinemas to present a ten-day film program alongside an exhibition of more than 100 works at the Gallery. The ‘Kiss of the Beast’ film program then travelled eX de Medici Australia b.1959 The theory of everything 2005 Watercolour and metallic pigment on Arches paper, 114.3 x 176.3cm Purchased 2005