AMaGA National Conference, Melbourne, 2018. Photo: Joel Checkley.
AMaGA National Conference
2026 | 3-5 November, Canberra
The 2026 AMaGA National Conference will be held in Canberra from Tuesday 3 to Thursday 5 November 2026. The Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House will serve as the conference hub, with elements of the program taking place across cultural sites and institutions across the National Triangle and Kamberri/Canberra - making the most of the extraordinary cultural precinct on Ngunnawal and Ngambri Country. The conference theme is Together: people, power and politics.
PREVIOUS CONFERENCES
The AMaGA National Conference represents a cornerstone of our professional development calendar, offering the largest annual forum for Australian museum and gallery professionals to engage in networking and knowledge exchange.
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The theme of 2024 was (un)Common Ground. It is a space where old and new ideas collide, where understandings and priorities converge, and where conversations between colleagues and communities are navigated. (un)Common Ground is an exploration of what brings us together and what keeps us apart. It explores the blurred boundaries where commonalities and divisions intertwine. The theme invites reflections and conversations that explore the relationships, structures and gaps that define (or constrain) our sector.
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The theme for this conference was Discomfort: Brave Conversations and New Connections in Changing Environments. AMaGA invited delegates to address uncomfortable but extremely important conversations to engage with the current issues facing the GLAM sector. 476 delegates attended face-to-face, with 340 virtual delegates.
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The theme for this conference was HEAR. US. NOW: Turning conversations into action. Over four days we heard from more than 50 speakers as they shared their concerns for our culture and called museums and galleries into action. AMaGA 2022 addressed how global issues are impacting the Arts in Australia and considered how your local activities connect to the Indian Ocean Rim communities.
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The theme for this conference was Creating the Future: Trust. Diversity. Imagination. AMaGA invited new perspectives on the museum and gallery sector’s role in creating the future. It was an ambitious, imaginative and outward-looking program that questioned assumptions. It addressed our sector’s impact on communities, ecologies and economies.
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The theme for this conference was At the Centre: Our People, Our Places, Our Practices, which investigated how museums and galleries are situated at the very centre of national conversations about identity, communities and relevance, our diverse public, and the way we are deeply implicated in both a local and national understanding of Australia’s past, present and shared future.
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The them for this conference was Agents of Change, which was designed to explore museums and galleries as spaces that can be used to promote social, political, and cultural change. The nature of the theme allowed speakers to discuss and question a range of often difficult and sensitive topics.