Focus Fest 2007
Agent Provocateurs (Inciting Agents)
Friday 30 November and Saturday 1 December 2007
"The artist as agent provocateur? In the teeth of the real world of politics, art looks pretty fragile: a sandbox activity. Any artwork is savagely outstripped by many of the things we see on the nightly news. Through the insightful actions of the agent provocateur, change can happen within a system through agencies that provoke debate and argument, unrest and sometimes even violence, challenging or disabling, fracturing or transforming the variables within that system. Through the artists' processes and the product, their artworks, they ambush the readymade signs and hijack official means to rattle the cages, and soon things start looking ripe for change."
- George Alexander, Coordinator, contemporary art programs

Highlights included the exhibitions Sidney Nolan retrospective and Michael Riley: sights unseen, a keynote address by Dr Natalya Lusty, senior lecturer, Department of Gender and Cultural Studies, University of Sydney, interviews with artists Mark Titmarsh and Del Kathryn Barton, and talks by Sebastian Chan, manager web services, Powerhouse Museum, and by curators and educators.

Focus Fest 2006
Gods and Goddesses: Myths and Meanings
Friday 1 and Saturday 2 December 2006
"Art, like life itself, can be both a blessing and a curse. Artists can also be seen as both creators and destroyers, mythmakers and mythbreakers and though, like the rest of us mere mortals nine-tenths of the time, they seem to partake in almost supernatural powers - gods and goddesses - beyond those of us in everyday life."

Highlights included the exhibitions Goddess: divine energy and Tezuka: the marvel of manga , a keynote address by Linda Jaivan, writer and freelance journalist, an interview by Jonathan Biggins with Wendy Whiteley, model and wife of 32 years to Brett Whiteley, and talks by artists Julie Rrap, Jenny Watson, Dennis del Favaro, Rose Farrell, George Parkin, Destiny Deacon and Virginia Fraser, and by curators, critics and educators.

Focus Fest 2005
Bearing Witness
Friday 2 and Saturday 3 December 2005
Increasingly in contemporary society there are more and more things we can do less and less about. On television and in newspapers images of war, distress or horror assault us on a daily basis, and the natural reaction is to insulate ourselves from the flood. Are there certain things best kept out of sight? This Focus Fest is an attempt to see the way in which art and artists confront those issues that we don't often have the means (mentally and emotionally) to deal with, that is, they bear witness.

Highlights included the exhibitions Camille Pissarro: the first Impressionist, Self portrait: Renaissance to contemporary and the 2006 Biennale of Sydney, a keynote address by Peter Garrett MP, AM, Federal Labor Member for Kingsford Smith, and talks by artists Fiona Hall, Mervyn Bishop and Hossein Valamanesh, and curators, critics and educators.

Focus Fest 2004
The Corporeal Landscape
Friday 3 and Saturday 4 December 2004
The corporeal landscape can be both material and tool, subject and object of visual arts practice. Explored one of the most enduring themes in art, where artists come to terms with themselves, others and their world, through the internal and external, the physical and psychological, across genres, cultures and historic divides.

Highlights included the exhibitions Crossing country: the alchemy of western Arnhem Land art and Bill Henson, with talks by major contemporary artists represented in the Gallery's permanent collections. The program incorporated lectures and workshops by curators, critics, educators and inter-disciplinary experts, providing rich resources for classroom programming and case study development.

Focus Fest 2003
Divining the Sacred and Profane
Friday 5 and Saturday 6 December 2003
This Focus Fest investigated the sacred and profane in conception and reception of art across cultures and historic divides. Highlights included the exhibitions Darkness and light: Caravaggio and his world and Colin McCahon: a question of faith and the Gallery's permanent collections, focusing on these as resources for classroom programming and case study development. The program incorporated lectures and workshops with artists, curators, critics, educators and interdisciplinary experts.

Focus Fest 2002
Issues and Theories: Contemporary Art
Recorded lectures from this Focus Fest are available in the Gallery's Library.

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