New acquisitions
Acquisitions policy | Vision and policies
The National Gallery of Australia is constantly adding to the national collection, keeping abreast of emerging art as well as expanding existing collections. The highlights featured in each issue of artonview are displayed here one month later.
Note: Previous acquisitions can be viewed in the overview of each collection area under the Collection tab in the main menu.
Theo Van Doesburg
Space-time construction #3 1923
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program by Penelope Seidler AM in memory of Harry Seidler AC, 2010
Space-time construction #3 is a 1923 painting in gouache on paper by the renowned leader of De Stijl, Theo van Doesburg. It remained a constant inspiration for the extraordinarily gifted architect the late Harry Seidler AC during his years of practice …
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
Eldorado 1892
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Acquired through the National Gallery of Australia Foundation, 2010
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec became renowned for his portrayal of subjects drawn from the Parisian demimonde in the late nineteenth century, producing astonishing images executed with an unerring and penetrating eye …
![image: Yami people
Taiwan
Main house post [tomok] 19th century
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra](/NewAcquisitions/IMAGES/197175.jpg)
Yami people
Taiwan
Main house post [tomok] 19th century
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Purchased 2009
This large and strikingly painted panel is an important new addition to the Gallery’s collection of Asian sculpture. It was created by Taiwan’s Yami people, an indigenous group who live on Botel Tobago (also known as Lanyu or Orchid Island), a small mountainous isolated island off the south-east coast of Taiwan …
![image: Nias people
Anthropomorphic stone monument [gowe salawa] 19th century or earlier
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra](/NewAcquisitions/IMAGES/191076.jpg)
Nias people
Anthropomorphic stone monument [gowe salawa] 19th century or earlier
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Purchased 2009
Situated off Sumatra’s west coast, the island of Nias is home to an ancient yet enduring tradition of monumental statuary in stone and wood. Ancestral and aristocratic effigies, pillars and seats of honour are still found today in Nias villages …
![image: Photographer unknown
Not titled [portrait of three Californian gold miners] c 1850
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Purchased 2009](/NewAcquisitions/IMAGES/191803.jpg)
Mutuaga
The drummer (1880–90)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Purchased 2009
It is rare that a Melanesian work of art from the nineteenth century can be attributed to an artist with any certainty, so the artist known as Mutuaga is a phenomenon …
George Baldessin
Walkers II 1966
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Gift of Lyn and Fred Williams, celebrating the National Gallery of Australia's 25th Anniversary, 2009
The prints and artists books in the Fred and Lyn Williams gift capture the milieu of the Melbourne art scene, with important examples from well-known printmakers including Tate Adams, Jan Senbergs, Franz Kempf, Noel Counihan and John Brack …
George Baldessin
A recurring day in the life of M.M. 1966
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Gift of Lyn and Fred Williams, celebrating the National Gallery of Australia's 25th Anniversary, 2009
The prints and artists books in the Fred and Lyn Williams gift capture the milieu of the Melbourne art scene, with important examples from well-known printmakers including Tate Adams, Jan Senbergs, Franz Kempf, Noel Counihan and John Brack …
Walangkura Napanangka
Untitled 2009
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Acquired in acknowledgement of the National Apology to the Stolen Generations with support from The Myer Foundation, 2010
When we contemplate the wonderful acrylic paintings from the Western Desert region of Central Australia, we immediately think of the small Aboriginal community of Papunya, the birthplace of the contemporary Indigenous art movement …
Shapoor Bhedwar
The Naver—Invocation 1892
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Purchased 2009
Between the 1890s and 1910s, Indian photographer Shapoor N Bhedwar was prominent in the art photography salons of Europe and America. Bhedwar (Shapurjee Nusserwanjee Bhedwar) came from a wealthy Parsi family in Bombay and in his youth developed passionate interests in art and Eastern and Western literature …