In a tremendous turnout, Canberra’s visual arts community was seen heaving a collective sigh of relief at the opening on Thursday of the new Grainger Gallery in Geelong Street Fyshwick, a significant moment for the local art scene in the wake of many commercial gallery closures.

The two-storey building has been fully refurbished by husband-and-wife owners Kacy and Richard Grainger, who have relocated from smaller premises in the Dairy Road precinct after five years. The couple have declared their intention to make the new gallery their long-term home.

Among the who’s who of prominent figures from the worlds of art and music, were behind-the-scenes supporters of the arts, notably Martin and Susie Beaver, former directors of the now-closed Beaver Galleries, who have been working closely with the Graingers to ensure that their former exhibitors continue to be supported.

First cab off the ranks is Regeneration Glyphs by eminent Canberra artist GW Bot, which occupies the entire gallery, both upstairs and downstairs and covers many media, including  large works in metal.

Bot is a printmaker, painter, sculptor and graphic artist who has held more than 60 solo exhibitions in cities including Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne, Brisbane, London, Paris, New York and Los Angeles. She says she adopted her exhibiting name about 40 years ago, drawing on an early French reference to “Le grand Wam Bot,” in homage to a favourite animal often found in her Cook garden.

Late last year, Bot’s exhibition Portrait of a Landscape at Belco Arts was named among the best arts moments of 2025, singled out for the artist’s use of signs, marks and symbols which she describes as glyphs. See

In a sign of good sales to come, a significant buyer had already jumped the gun and, earlier on Thursday, purchased the exhibition‘s largest work, the linocut-on-tapa cloth, To Walk Across a Field (unique), 2006.

Speaking at the event, Richard Grainger recounted meeting Kacy while he was studying law and she was studying art at the Australian National University. Kacy later worked with a commercial gallery in the ACT before the couple decided to establish their own art business.

Kacy then outlined the hard work involved in transforming the Geelong Street premises into the new gallery space, while Martin and Susie Beaver also expressed their pleasure that Grainger Gallery would continue the exhibiting tradition they had worked to build over many years.

Regeneration Glyphs by GW Bot, Grainger Gallery, 1/34 Geelong Street, Fyshwick, until March 1.