National Gallery of Australia, founded in 1967 - is the main art gallery and museum in Canberra .  One of the first promoters of the idea of ​​creating a national art gallery in the early 20th century was the famous Australian artist Tom Roberts .  In 1912, the Australian Parliament established the Historic Memorial Council, which decided to assemble a collection of portraits of Australian governor-generals, politicians and other "fathers" of the nation .  The person responsible for this large-scale event was appointed to the Advisory Board of the Commonwealth of the Arts, which operated until 1973 .  The first collections were exhibited in the building of the Parliament of Australia, because as the Great Depression and World War II did not allow for many years to find funds for the construction of a special building .  Only in 1965 it was decided to build the National Gallery, but the construction only began in 1973 and lasted almost 10 years .  In 1982, the grand opening of the National Gallery of Australia took place in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II .

Gallery area of ​​23,000 m? built in the style brutalism: sculpture garden surrounded the building is distinguished by the angular shape and rough texture of the concrete, contrasting with the lush tropical greenery. Interestingly, the concrete on the outside of the building is not finished by any plaster or paneling or painting, and interior walls have only recently been covered with boards.

On the main floor there is a vast exhibition halls, which house a collection dedicated to the Australian Aborigines, as well as European and American collections .  The basis of the collection is native so-called "Aboriginal Memorial" - 200 painted logs that Aborigines tagged grave .  Memorial dedicated to all indigenous people who died from 1788 to 1988, defending their land from foreigners .  European and American art is represented by works by artists such as Paul Cézanne, Claude Monet, Jackson Pollock, Andy Warhol and others .  The ground floor given over to an exhibition of Asian art (Iran, Japan, Thailand and China) from the Neolithic to the present day: it contains numerous sculptures, miniatures, a collection of Chinese woodblock prints, ceramics and textiles .  Finally, on the top floor you can see directly the Australian art - various objects created in Australia since the time of European settlement until the 20th century .  That's paintings, sculptures, furnishings, pictures and more .  Total Gallery has more than 120,000 works of art .