Australian Focus For April Events

Wellington City Gallery

Talks by Sidney Nolan's biographer Brian Adams and Ned Kelly expert Ian Jones are among the highlights of the City Gallery's public programme for next month. Also featuring are music and dance performances with an Australian theme, by students of the VUW School of Music, and the New Zealand School of Dance.

The Gallery's public programme events are free with admission to the current exhibitions, and run until 18 May. A Multi Visit Ticket (5 visits) is available for $20.

In his talk, writer and TV producer / director Brian Adams, O.A.M., will explore the trials and triumphs of writing biography, concentrating on Sidney Nolan but also such diverse figures as opera singer Joan Sutherland and naturalist Joseph Banks. He will also reminisce about his early career in Wellington as a 2ZB and 2YA announcer in the 1960s. Sunday 14 April, 2pm.

The following weekend, Ian Jones, author of Ned Kelly: a short life and the foremost authority on Kelly, talks to Wellington writer Damien Wilkins. Disentangling fact from myth in the life of Ned Kelly is the theme of this discussion. Saturday 20 April, 2pm. Fans of Tracey Moffatt's startling photographs and films will be able to get an overview of the artist's remarkable career by Judy Annear, Senior Curator Photography, at Art Gallery of New South Wales, in an illustrated talk called Backroads and Backlots: The Serial Worlds of Tracey Moffatt. Saturday 6 April, 2pm.

Other speakers next month are Andrew Sayers, Australia's leading Nolan critic; Kim O'Loughlin (Auckland Art Gallery); Tony Bellette, (Senior Associate in English & Art History, VUW); and Dr Lydia Weavers, director of the Stout Centre, VUW, who will talk about literary modernism in 1940s Australia.

"We are delighted to be hosting such a wide range of keynote international speakers as part of the Australian Art Series," says Paula Savage, director, City Gallery Wellington. "Many of these guest speakers are acknowledged experts in their fields, and their talks will greatly add to visitors' experience of these exhibitions."

Full details of the public programme in the Open City brochure at the Gallery, in Art Stands around town and at www.city-gallery.org.nz. Public tours of the exhibitions run every Saturday and Sunday at 12pm from the Gallery foyer. The Gallery is open 10am to 5pm daily (except Christmas Day). Sidney Nolan's Ned Kelly Series is presented by Ernst & Young, Russell McVeagh and Telecom New Zealand Ltd. Indemnified by the New Zealand Government. Generously supported by The Breeze. A 2002 New Zealand Festival event. Tracey Moffatt is presented by Saatchi & Saatchi. Mikala Dwyer is a City Gallery Wellington Australian Artist's Project, presented by Silverscreen and Oktobor. Open City public programme Principal Sponsor Montana Wines Ltd. City Gallery Wellington is managed by the Wellington Museums Trust with major funding from the Wellington City Council.

ENDS

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