Speeches
Saturday, 28 February 2026
AGSA Biennial Ambassadors Dinner
Rod and I are delighted to join you this evening to celebrate the 2026 Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art and to thank ambassadors for their generous support.
We especially welcome those of you who have travelled from interstate. We had the pleasure of meeting many of you two years ago at Government House.
Rod and I are honoured to serve as joint Patrons of the Art Gallery of South Australia, and to exercise our roles this evening in the magnificent Elder Wing of Australian Art, surrounded by works that speak to who we are, and who we are becoming, as a nation.
The Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art has been a vital component of the Adelaide Festival since 1990.
It’s an exhibition that has shaped careers, attracted more than 1.8 million visitors, and confirmed South Australia's place as a home of serious, ambitious, world-class contemporary art.
The 20th Biennial, Yield Strength, examines materials, selfhood and society, tested and transformed under pressure, and I acknowledge the outstanding work of curator Ellie Buttrose.
The 24 artists featured in this exhibition are doing exactly what artists have always done, often in important social, cultural and political moments: revealing complexity, and inviting us to sit with it.
Art is for all of us. It is where we examine ourselves and the world around us, and the forces acting upon both.
Art helps us to build the empathy and understanding that sustain healthy communities.
We are heartened by the depth of engagement with these themes in Yield Strength.
We are grateful to AGSA staff and the Biennial Ambassadors Committee for bringing together the largest cohort of ambassadors since the program's inception in 2014.
When we attended this dinner two years ago, we were struck by the number of ambassadors who had travelled from interstate for the occasion – as we are again, this evening.
As people who care deeply about contemporary Australian art, you have chosen to invest your time and resources in our state’s and our nation’s artistic life.
It’s a choice made from considerable generosity and an elevated perspective.
Your support, alongside the support of all ambassadors, makes an important contribution that cannot be underestimated.
It funds artists, sustains curators, and provides a platform to voices which might otherwise go unheard.
And it guarantees that South Australia can continue to stage an exhibition of this calibre, free to all who walk into the gallery, the Samstag Museum and Adelaide Botanic Garden, our fellow Biennial hosts.
Rod and I thank AGSA and Adelaide Festival for their vision and the sustained effort that the Biennial demands.
We have no doubt that Yield Strength will be well visited and widely celebrated throughout its season.
To the artists with us this evening – thank you for creating your extraordinary works, and for sharing them with us.
Your art inspires us with its ideas, its raw beauty and power.
To our ambassadors – those who’ve been involved for many years, and those joining this family of supporters for the first time - thank you.
Thank you for giving South Australians, and visitors from across the country and the world, the opportunity to experience art which helps them make sense of our tumultuous times.
May the 2026 Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art be the finest yet.