Go behind the scenes of Melbourne’s famed art and culture

Jump the queue and enjoy a VIP take on art, sport and history with these behind-the-scenes tours in Melbourne, writes Susan Skelly. 

When you visit an unfamiliar city, it’s handy to know that someone has cherry-picked the best behind-the-scenes showcases.

Cultural Attractions of Australia (CAOA) selects from a portfolio of 19 vibrant organisations, embracing galleries, performing arts, sporting attractions, museums and tours, several in Melbourne. They recently launched new premium tours at NGV Australia and NGV International, the Melbourne Cricket Ground, and in Ballarat at Sovereign Hill.

Explore the National Gallery of Victoria

The National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) campus is buzzing. The blockbuster ‘Pharaoh’ and ‘Africa Fashion’ exhibitions have left the building and in their wake come Rekospective: The Art of Reko Rennie and Bark Salon, the largest-ever staging of the NGV’s collection of bark paintings.

Being prepped for a December opening is NGV Friday Nights: Yayoi Kusama, a survey of one of Japan’s most inventive artists.

Curator Michael Gentle walks us through Wurrdha Marra, NGV Australia’s dedicated First Nations space, first stop is a new gallery dedicated to a single Indigenous artist for the next couple of months, the late Destiny Deacon.

NGV International

We step into the bright white Conservation Studio at NGV International, where experts in media art, frames and furniture, paintings, paper and photographs, fashion and textiles are working small miracles.

Their tools of trade include brushes of palm squirrel hair, microscopes, scalpels, fine Japanese paper and pigments that chart centuries of trade.

A puncture and crease are being addressed in a black-and-white photograph; tears, insect damage and pigment loss are the targets of conservationists working on 18th-century Indian paintings. Rembrandt etchings are on the bench for reference.

Guiding this behind-the-scenes recce is NGV’s Head of Conservation, Michael Varcoe-Cocks, who shows us how infra-red technology reveals hidden drawings behind The First Cloud, an 1887 painting by William Quiller Orchardson and the many decisions and changes the artist made along the way.

A chunky neckpiece by Lorna Fencer Napurrula is undergoing a condition report ahead of an overseas loan. A glossy ceramic sculpture by Thai-born Australian artist Vipoo Srivilasa is being catalogued.

Restorer Carl Villis is retouching a 17th-Century canvas, Romantic Landscape with Mercury and Argus, by Salvator Rosa. “It’s like replacing lost pixels,” Villis says. “We try to leave what’s left of the original and fill in the missing bits – a pointillist attitude!”

In one of the European Paintings Gallery is The Banquet of Cleopatra by Giambattista Tiepolo, a 1740s work based on Cleopatra’s wager that she could stage a feast more lavish than those of Mark Antony. It’s the backdrop for a wine-matched eight-course dinner with live music, on the side a private evening tour, with a curator, of the highlights of the NGV collection.

Experience the excitement of the Melbourne Cricket Ground

At the MCG, Taylor Swift and the AFL grand final have come and gone and seven wickets are being prepared for the Test Cricket on Boxing Day.

An MCG Premium Access Tour is two hours of sporting bliss. With a personal guide, step onto the MCG turf for a 360-degree panorama, then see cricket viewing rooms, change rooms, recovery pools and media hangouts. Go behind the scenes of the prestigious Melbourne Cricket Club. Refuel with pasta and tiramisu in the Committee Room by Grossi.

The Keepers’ Collection Tour is a private walk-through of areas of the MCG that are unknown to most. Treasures date back to the 1800s, from trophies and uniforms to artwork and sporting equipment.

In what is claimed to be one of the largest museum storerooms, we see the Melbourne Cup won in 2015 by Michelle Payne riding Prince of Penzance; the tandem bike whose riders won an Olympic gold medal in 1956; and Mark Knight’s 2024 AFL Grand Final poster art of the Brisbane Lions.

In the interactive, sensory Australian Sports Museum take a glimpse at Cathy Freeman’s Swift Suit, a Layne Beachley surfboard, the sacksful of fan mail for Ian Thorpe and State of Origin Final footballs.

We stop by the Melbourne Cricket Club Library to seek out A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongues, compiled by Randle Cotgrave and published in 1611. It contains the earliest printed reference to the game of cricket and is the library’s oldest tome.

Outside the library is a life-sized statue of Don Bradman and, nearby, the 7m x 2m 150th Anniversary Tapestry, featuring seminal figures in Australian sport. Unveiled in 2003, it is a collaboration between artist Robert Ingpen and the Victorian Tapestry Workshop.

Travel back in time in Sovereign Hill

Further afield, near Sovereign Hill in Ballarat, are two new centres whose back-of-house tours celebrate craftsmanship and the minutiae of life on the goldfields.

The Australian Centre for Gold Rush Collections is home to 150,000 objects, from gold silk ballgowns to Eureka Stockade memorabilia, the head of a Chinese processional dragon called Loong, and a fabulous emu feather skirt made by fibre artist Tammy Gilson.

In the Centre for Rare Arts and Forgotten Trades are power hammers, lathes, forges and a squirrel press. Five studios are dedicated to metalwork, woodwork, leatherwork, fashion and textiles, and decorative arts. Upcoming are workshops in knifemaking, drum-making and garment construction.

Says Erin Santamaria, general manager of the Rare Trades Centre: “Like language, once the skills and knowledge are lost you can’t get them back.”

A significant new artwork at Sovereign Hill presides over the tranquil sculpture-dotted Wadawurrung Cultural Precinct. Called All Nations, it’s by Marlene Gilson OAM, one of only three Aboriginal artists invited to represent Australia this year in the Venice Biennale. As do the back-of-house tours, the 160cm x 200cm print on aluminium returns Chinese and Indigenous stories to the Gold Rush narrative.