Shepparton Art Museum by Denton Corker Marshall
Australia’s newest art museum, Shepparton Art Museum opened its doors with nine free exhibitions, four new artwork commissions and presenting more than 200 artists in a celebration of the area’s rich and diverse culture, people and landscape.
Designed by Australian architecture firm Denton Corker Marshall and spanning five floors, the new AUD 50 million Shepparton Art Museum (SAM) houses over 4,000 artworks, with over 200 artists represented and 160 Indigenous and First Nations artworks on display, including its nationally recognised ceramics collection and the nation’s most significant collection of South-East Australian Aboriginal art.
The design is characterised by simplicity and clarity, with compelling imagery creating a landmark cultural destination.
The restricted ground floor, required by a floodway across the site, is turned into a real opportunity by extruding the small footprint vertically over five levels, creating a distinctive small and tall art museum.
This has the advantage of maximising much used park space while creating a beacon in the low, flat Shepparton landscape. It also offers prospect to the park, lake and town centre, along with panoramic views of the Goulbourn Red River Gum reserve from the roof top events space.
Design of the expanded park also includes a dramatic Art Hill, screening all building services.
The new museum opens with nine free exhibitions spanning sculpture, painting, video, photography, ceramics and installation including the first significant showing of works by Lin Onus, the acclaimed Yorta Yorta artist, on Country, Lin Onus: The Land Within. Also premiering is Flow: Stories of River, Earth and Sky, an exhibition showcasing over 60 artists from SAM’s collection including major new acquisitions shown for the first time, the nation’s largest holding of works by the extended Namatjira family and works from the Carrillo and Ziyin Gantner Collection of Australian Indigenous Art.
Internally, the transparent and accessible museum experience is centred around an open, circulation galleria with four different galleries, totalling 800m2, accommodated across four floors including two major AA rated exhibition spaces which can accommodate exhibitions and loans of international significance. The gallery spaces include The Lin Onus Gallery, People’s Gallery, Williamson Community Space, SAM Kids Space, the Bill Kelly Peace Room designed as a collection viewing space, and Showcases at the entrance to SAM and across each floor featuring new commissions and SAM’s nationally significant ceramics collection.
“SAM has been designed as a live building where every surface presents an opportunity to display and be surrounded by art and experience, whether you go to the cafe, drop into the shop or even drive past at night when the gallery is closed.
We are proud to be putting Shepparton on the cultural map and to contribute to radically changing this unique part of regional Victoria,” said SAM Artistic Director and CEO, Rebecca Coates.
Unveiled for the first time are four new artwork commissions and artworks by emerging and established Australian artists including the new work Connection to Country – I Remember When...,2021 by acclaimed Yorta Yorta, Wamba Wamba, Mutti Mutti and Boonwurrung artist, Maree Clarke (above);
a new participatory video installation by one of Australia’s foremost artists and choreographers Amrita Hepi (above) and Determination by Congo-born artist Pierre Mukeba which is inspired by the African diaspora in Australia. New site-specific installations include the large-scale artwork on SAM’s inaugural Art Wall Looking out and across, up and down, the river sometimes becomes a cloud, 2021 by multi-disciplinary artist Louisa Bufardeci; Anne-Marie May’s luminous installation Everything Joyful is Mobile which is suspended from SAM’s Atrium and Central Void spaces and James Geurts’ installation Trajectories: Orbiting Bodies Meet which draws on the museum’s close geographical proximity to the landing site of the Murchison meteorite and is commissioned for display on SAM’s 4th Floor Terrace.
Susan Norrie: Imagining a Future, 2019 (oil on canvas, 64 x 114 cm). Shepparton Art Museum Collection, purchased with the assistance of the Friends of Shepparton Art Museum, 2019. © and courtesy of the artist
Also opening to the public is Everyday Australian Design: Functional Design from the Ian Wong Collection which celebrates everyday objects from Australian daily life and culture and many of Australia’s most significant and awarded designers; Brown Pot, an exhibition exploring the evolving story of Australian studio pottery from the 1950s to today and Fresh: GV Top Art & Design, 2021 featuring artworks and design presentations from talented year 11 and 12 VCE Art, Studio Arts and Visual Communication Design students studying across 14 schools in North Central and Hume regions of Victoria in 2020.
Designed to act as a community and arts and cultural hub for the Greater Shepparton region, the new SAM building also houses the Shepparton Visitors’ Information Centre; Kaiela Arts, Shepparton’s Aboriginal community arts centre; an outdoor amphitheatre and Art Hill; and cafe and 150-person event space and terrace, all within an 5,300m2 cubic building.
Situated in regional Victoria around two hours’ drive north from Melbourne, SAM is located on the lands of the Yorta Yorta peoples, on the shore of Victoria Park Lake, Shepparton. The new building was funded by Greater Shepparton City Council (AUD 15.35 million); the Australian Government (AUD 15 million); Victorian State Government (AUD 12.5 million) and private philanthropic and community support through the SAM Foundation (AUD 7.5 million).
Hero picture © John Gollings Photography
