Aussie rules A whopping new extension to the Art Gallery of New South Wales opens this month, doubling exhibition space. Here’s what to expect

Art Gallery of New South Wales extension Sydney Opens 3 December

Dubbed the Sydney Modern Project, Japanese architecture firm SANAA’s AU$344m extension to the city’s greatest museum houses modern and contemporary displays. The inaugural commission for the Tank – a repurposed Second World War fuel reservoir – by ArgentinePeruvian artist Adrián Villar Rojas takes inspiration from the subterranean setting (pictured).

New Acquisitions

Dreamhome: Stories of Art and Shelter

Dreamhome: Stories of Art and Shelter

Yiribana Gallery

Alongside the extension, the gallery has recently undergone a comprehensive restoration of the Grand Courts at the heart of the the old building, with a rehang that includes recently acquired works such as Aesop (c. 1625–31) by the 17th-century Baroque master Jusepe de Ribera and a new sculptural commission by the Cameroonian artist Pascale Marthine Tayou. Meanwhile, an exhibition in the new building includes Little Old Man (pictured; 1973) by Barkley L. Hendricks which goes on show for the first time.

This exhibition, one of the inaugural large-scale displays in the new building, brings together collection highlights, recent acquistions and new commissions to consider how artists from across the world reflect on the meaning of home. Recent purchases on show include Simone Leigh’s mixed media sculpture Sentinel (pictured; 2019) and Samara Golden’s skyscraper-like installation Guts (2022); there are also works by Cape Town-based artist Igshaan Adams, Los Angeles-based Sayre Gomez and John Prince Siddon from Western Australia.

The original Yiribana Gallery opened in 1994 as the AGNSW’s dedicated space for the work of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists. It has now been relocated to the gallery’s new building, with a display inspired by the Sydney-language word burbangana, meaning ‘to take hold of my hand and help me up’; new acquisitions are included alongside old favourites, while a large-scale commission by the Waradgerie artist Lorraine Connelly-Northey is hung across the gallery’s 20m window.

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DECEMBER 2022 APOLLO