Image: Canberra Museum and Gallery
Canberra Museum and Gallery will present 'RELICS: A New World Rises', an immersive LEGO® exhibition running from 19 September 2026 to 31 January 2027. Created by LEGO® Masters winners Jackson Harvey and Alex Towler, the exhibition brings more than 15 large-scale installations to Canberra, turning vintage and forgotten objects into miniature worlds built from LEGO® bricks.
The exhibition is framed as both a nostalgia trip and an immersive art experience. According to the museum’s exhibition page, a refrigerator becomes a cryogenic wellness resort, a Volkswagen Beetle powers an underground energy revolution, and a grandfather clock becomes a time machine. Across the installations, tiny civilisations have adapted to the objects left behind by humanity, with each scene filled with hidden details, layered narratives and unexpected humour.
Canberra Museum and Gallery describes the project as combining sculpture, design, storytelling and nostalgia. The exhibition is set in an imagined future in which humans have abandoned Earth, and it playfully explores creativity, consumer culture, sustainability and the objects people leave behind. The museum says the exhibition is designed for a wide audience, from adults and families to children, and invites visitors to slow down and look more closely at the work.
The exhibition comes with a price structure set out on the museum’s site: general admission is $23, concession, students and members $19, children $15, infants aged 0–3 free, and a family ticket for two adults and two children is $70. Companion Card holders may bring one companion free of charge. Ticketing is being handled month by month across the run, with available dates and session times listed for September through January.
Canberra is presented as the final Australian stop for 'RELICS: A New World Rises' before the project heads to the United States, according to the museum’s email announcement. The email also says the exhibition has already been seen by more than half a million visitors across Australia and New Zealand, giving the Canberra showing a place at the end of its Australian tour.
Alongside the exhibition, Canberra Museum and Gallery has listed a series of related public programs. These include 'Inside RELICS: Preview with the Creators' on Friday 18 September at 4pm, 'Inside RELICS: Meet the Creators' on Saturday 19 September at 2pm, and a school holiday workshop, 'Make your own RELIC', running on 29 and 30 September and 1 October for ages 5 to 13. The museum also has a competition titled 'Design Your Own RELIC' linked to the exhibition, inviting participants to imagine a future Canberra in the year 2130 and create their own brick civilisation inside an everyday object.
The exhibition will be shown at Canberra Museum and Gallery, Cnr London Circuit and Civic Square, Canberra City, from 19 September 2026 to 31 January 2027.
