Jackson Pollock's Blue poles will hang at the Art Gallery of Western Australia in Perth from April to September 2027, the first time the painting has been shown in the west and its first loan to an Australian venue since 2003.
The Australian Government bought the work for the national collection in 1973. It was valued at $500 million in 2023, which makes it the most valuable painting the National Gallery of Australia holds.
The timing is not incidental. The gallery in Canberra is working through a $320 million building program that began in January, covering roofing, skylights, windows, lifts, air conditioning and fire safety systems, and the rolling closures reach 60 to 70 per cent of the building across 2027 and 2028. Sending the painting west keeps it on a wall for that period instead of in a crate.
It travels under Sharing the National Collection, which lends works from Canberra to state and regional galleries. As at 30 June 2026 the program had made 327 loans to 42 venues, seen by 2.1 million people. Partner galleries have reported visitor increases of up to 51 per cent, and Wanneroo Regional Gallery in Perth's northern suburbs reported a 750 per cent rise after showing Andy Warhol works in 2024.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the national collection "belongs to every Australian, no matter where they live".
Arts Minister Tony Burke said "the greatest works in the world shouldn't only be seen in private collections".
National Gallery director Nick Mitzevich said that when Blue poles entered the collection "it signalled ambition, confidence and belief in the importance of art to national life", and that sharing it now "sustains that vision".
The purchase is the part most Australians still know. In August 1973 the gallery's acting director James Mollison agreed to pay $1.3 million for the painting, the most anyone had paid for an American work at that point. Mollison could not authorise a purchase above $1 million on his own, so it went to Gough Whitlam, who approved it and decided the price would be made public. The papers ran it for weeks.
Fifty three years later, the painting held up as proof of a government wasting public money is the most valuable in the collection it was bought for.
Blue poles opens at AGWA in April 2027 and comes down in September. The National Gallery has said it will lean on Australian works in Canberra while the closures run.
