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The National Portrait Gallery acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to Elders both past and present.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are warned that this website contains images of deceased persons.

Women Make History

In Galleries Seven, Eight and Nine

Previous exhibition
from Saturday 20 November 2021 until Sunday 29 May 2022
Helena Rubinstein in a red brocade Balenciaga gown
Collection display in Gallery Eight, March 2022
1 Helena Rubinstein in a red brocade Balenciaga gown, 1957 Graham Sutherland. © Estate of Graham Sutherland, Currently on display. 2 Collection display in Gallery Eight, March 2022.

Well behaved women seldom make history, as the saying goes, and the National Portrait Gallery, consequently, is full of awesome Australian women who refused to conform to narrow ideas about their place and their worth. This selection of works from the Gallery’s collection samples 100 such stories. Suffragettes, war heroes, wordsmiths and Nobel laureates; rock stars, record-breakers, divas and fashionistas; from the first woman elected to the House of Representatives to the first female Chief Justice of the High Court: Women Make History provides irrefutable proof that national portrait galleries aren’t all about dead white males.

Portraits on display
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Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily
Chrissy Amphlett
Lindy Lee
1 Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily, 1993 Jenny Sages. © Jenny Sages. 2 Chrissy Amphlett "Temperamental", 1989 Ivan Durrant. © Ivan Durrant/Copyright Agency, 2024. 3 Lindy Lee, 2003 Greg Weight. © Gregory Weight/Copyright Agency, 2024.
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The National Portrait Gallery acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to Elders past and present. We respectfully advise that this site includes works by, images of, names of, voices of and references to deceased people.

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