John Brack Exhibition

On the long week end in June I took the children to see the John Brack Exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria (Ian Potter Centre).

Access to the NGV is free but the Brack’s exhibition itself does have an admission fee. (Adult: $15, Concession: $12, Children: $7.50 (Ages 5–15), Family: $42, NGV Member Adult: $7.50, NGV Member Family: $21). We were lucky enough to be given a family membership for Christmas last year, so the exhibition only cost us $21, which is great value.

We picked up some of the booklets provided for the kids and walked around the exhibition looking at “What John Brack saw…:”. The exhibition spanned his work from the 50’s right through until the 90’s.

My kids found Brack’s work engaging and accessible. The booklet gave us some information on key paintings and questions to get the kids really looking at the art work.

There are distinct differences in Brack’s style through the decades and it was interesting to see the preferences of the children.

The 5 and 3 year old were definitely more drawn to his earlier work like The car (1955) and Subdivision (1954). Myself, the 10 and 8 year old were fascinated by his work in the 1980’s, in which he used pencils as a representation of people. We spent quite a bit of time (as much as the 3 year old could tolerate!) examining The battle (1981-83).

Children's Activities Art Cart Melbourne

A free drop in Artcart activity is offered between 12pm – 4pm on Sundays. We missed out on the John Brack activity which finished the week end before, but participated in an activity related to a furniture design exhibition that was on. The children made some very cute creations which we took home with us.

Children's Activities NGV Melbourne

We now have the Salvador Dali exhibition to look forward too!