Wednesday, 29 July 2026

 Nina TAYLOR (Albert Park) (19:14): (1744) My adjournment is for the Minister for Creative Industries Vicki Ward. The action I seek is for the minister to join me in visiting the Australian Tapestry Workshop in South Melbourne to view the tapestry currently being woven for the South Melbourne Town Hall, which will be installed as a permanent feature on the hall once its renovation and restoration are complete. The Australian Tapestry Workshop was established by the Victorian government in 1976, and 50 years and over 500 tapestries later, it continues to bring together leading contemporary artists and highly skilled master weavers to create works of extraordinary artistic and cultural significance. Our Labor government provides the workshop with $225,750 per year through the creative enterprises program and has previously commissioned artworks for several Victorian hospitals.

The tapestry being created for the South Melbourne Town Hall is named the Rhythm of the Reeds, with artwork by First Nations artist Maree Clark, and will take over 6500 hours of work by members of the tapestry workshop to be completed. When the town hall reopens this work will become a permanent part of one of South Melbourne’s most important heritage buildings, welcoming residents, visitors and community groups for decades to come. A visit by the minister would provide an opportunity to see this extraordinary tapestry while it is still on the loom, to meet the talented weavers and to acknowledge the value of continued Victorian government support for important local organisations in the visual arts, such as the Australian Tapestry Workshop.

Accordingly, the action I seek is that the Minister for Creative Industries visit the Australian Tapestry Workshop to view the South Melbourne Town Hall tapestry in progress, meet with the workshop’s artists and weavers and recognise the important role that public art, creative institutions and sustained government investments in the arts play in enriching Victoria’s communities and securing our position as Australia’s creative capital.