Image: A GALLERY, Salt Lake City
The National Portrait Gallery in Canberra is presenting ‘Thread: Connecting stories and community’, an exhibition co-designed and co-curated with Logan Art Gallery and with artists and creatives from Logan, Queensland. Entry is free, bookings are not required, and the exhibition is on daily from 4 July until Sunday 13 September 2026, leaving under two weeks to see it.
The exhibition traces the relationships between garments and the histories, labour and knowledge systems of First Peoples, setting clothing and body adornment within a broader cultural framework and offering pathways for deeper intercultural understanding.
First presented at Logan Art Gallery, the show combines works from the National Portrait Collection, including 19th-century prints and contemporary photographs, with existing and newly commissioned works by Logan-based artists: Quandamooka woman Kyra Mancktelow, who has cultural links to Eulo and to the South Sea Islander community in Vanuatu; Pamela See (Xue Mei Ling); and the Sāmoan/Australian collective Lanatina Ilianoa Ah Kuoi and Sualauvi Ah Kuoi.
The core commission is a possum-skin cloak made by Mancktelow together with her family, community and Elders over the course of the Logan showing. That work, alongside other responsive artworks made in situ, is on show for the first time in the Canberra presentation.
The project grew out of a creative consultation process grounded in deep listening and reflection with parts of Logan’s diverse community, and was run as a pilot for new ways of working with communities across Australia. It is supported by the Australian Government. An installation view supplied by the gallery shows works by Kyra Mancktelow, Jacob Nash and Robert Rosen in Gallery 3.
The National Portrait Gallery is at King Edward Terrace, Parkes, ACT 2600. It is open daily from 10am to 5pm, except on 25 December.
