Conrad Martens View of the Heads, Port Jackson 1853
Purchased with assistance from Overseas Containers Australia Ltd 1986

Noel Counihan Waterside worker 1963
©Reproduced with permission of Pat Counihan

The collection of Australian Prints, Drawings and Watercolours at the Art Gallery of New South Wales is one of the most important in the country.

The first acquisition of the Art Gallery of New South Wales was an Australian watercolour - Apsley Falls by Conrad Martens. Commissioned by the NSW Academy of Art in 1874, it initiated not just the collection of Australian Prints, Drawings and Watercolours, but the State collection as well. From this modest beginning, significant gifts and purchases over the last 130 years have led to a extraordinary collection numbering well over 10,000 works.

The collection is richly varied and wide-ranging. There are classic works by Louis Buvelot, Julian Ashton, Tom Roberts and Arthur Streeton; by Blamire Young, J J Hilder, Hans Heysen and Lloyd Rees; Margaret Preston and Thea Proctor, William Dobell and Russell Drysdale; Arthur Boyd, Fred Williams and John Olsen to name just some of the best known.

Australian Prints, Drawings and Watercolours are central to the Gallery's active program of exhibitions and publications - an integral component of permanent displays of Australian art, as well as the subject of thematic exhibitions. Concentrated research on the collection in recent years has resulted in a number of memorable exhibitions and publications on prints and drawings by individual Australian artists such as George Lambert, Lloyd Rees, William Dobell, Salvatore Zofrea, Fred Williams and James Gleeson. Access to the collection is not limited to exhibition and publication however. Any interested member of the public, as well as students, artists and scholars may view works year-round in the Study Room.

The collection of Australian Prints, Drawings and Watercolours is a fundamental component of the Gallery's collection, offering a unique perspective on Australian art, and the Department maintains an active policy of acquiring works of historical and contemporary significance.

For more information contact:
Business Development Coordinator (02) 9225 1746

Download the Foundation Application Form (PDF, 60 KB)

(The Art Gallery of New South Wales Foundation is the Gallery’s major acquisition fund and umbrella organisation for all Gallery benefactor groups.)