ADELAIDE.- Each year for the month of August, the Art Gallery of South Australia leads the South Australian Living Artists (SALA) Festival by hosting the official city-wide opening, and staging displays showcasing works of art by South Australian artists, including the SALA Festival featured artist and monograph recipient. This year the Art Gallery will present five displays and offer a host of talks and events in celebration of our local living artists.

Art Gallery of South Australia, Co-Acting Director, Lisa Slade says ‘Championing South Australian artists is so important, and we are thrilled that we are able to do so every August through the SALA Festival. In 2018, the Gallery is proud to be celebrating South Australian art in all its forms from glass to photography to jewellery and desert paintings.’

Displays include:

Clare Belfrage From July 26 to 16 September | Gallery 12
As the 2018 SALA Monograph Artist, the Art Gallery presents a display of works by Clare Belfrage spanning 15 years of her practice. Eleven glass sculptures by Belfrage from the Gallery’s collection will be displayed in Gallery 12 alongside over 2,000 years of glass, ceramic and metal vessels.

Clare Belfrage discusses her 25-year career producing delicate, translucent, leaf-like glass forms in an artist talk on Saturday 18 August at 2pm in the Radford Auditorium. Free entry. Arrive early to avoid disappointment.

In good company: the drawings of Geoff Wilson From 6 July to 25 November | Gallery 19A & Atrium
Showcasing the artist’s sketchbooks and drawings, this display explores Geoff Wilson’s travels across Europe and his numerous trips through South Australia through pen, ink and watercolour. This display spans the artist’s seven-decade career and features over 85 works of art.

An in-conversation with artist Geoff Wilson and author John Neylon will be presented as part of First Fridays on Friday 3 August at 6pm in the Function Room. Free entry.

Geoff Wilson and curator Alice Clanachan will also present a Lunchtime Talk on Tuesday 7 August at 12.30pm. Free entry.

Ian North: Fleurieu! From 4 August to 4 November | Vestibule
As a South Australian treasure, Ian North has been making photographs for six decades. One of his recurring subjects is the South Australian Fleurieu Peninsula. In this display, ten panoramic colour photographs continue North’s interrogation of landscape and identity.

Curator Maria Zagala introduces Ian North’s recent series of photographs of the Fleurieu Peninsula in a Lunchtime Talk on Tuesday 21 August at 12.30pm in the Vestibule. Free entry

To Have and to Hold: The Daalder Collection of Contemporary Jewellery From 21 July to January 2019 | Gallery 8
In 2017, the Art Gallery received a generous donation of 161 outstanding examples of jewellery from private collectors Truus and Joost Daalder. The collection traverses 100 years of jewellery and includes work by a host of leading South Australian jewellers including Julie Blyfield and Catherine Truman. Presented as a precious jewel box, the exhibition invites an intimate encounter with works of art designed to be worn on the body.

Desert Colour Now showing to January 2019| Gallery 7
All of the paintings selected for this display were made in the desert, painted on Country, by artists living and working in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands. Made over the last fifteen years, these vibrant visions attest to the ongoing responsibility to Country for Anangu and celebrate the vitality of the living desert as home, or ngura. Featuring works of art by Wawiriya Burton, Pepai Jangala Carroll and the Ken Family.

Admission is free for all 2018 SALA Festival displays at the Art Gallery of South Australia.