Arts organisations are gearing up to move into the new Kingston Arts Precinct in late 2025, with designs for the project around the heritage-registered powerhouse due to be lodged later this year.
A reference group will also be established to advise on the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Space slated for inclusion in the precinct, which has been mooted since the 1990s.
Applications for the reference group opened on Tuesday, with the government seeking arts, management and business experts to contribute to the design of the space and prepare for "independent First Nations led operation of that space".
ArtsACT, the government agency responsible for managing the arts sector in Canberra, this month said: "This is certain to be a significant year in the development of the Kingston Arts Precinct as the project team progresses plans and lodges design documentation for approval."
NH Architecture was in March 2023 appointed by the Suburban Land Agency to design the project. NH Architecture has worked on the Queen Victoria Market renewal project in Melbourne, along with the Melbourne Arts Precinct transformation.
A place brief released at the time noted global successes in clustering arts organisations.
"It not only supports collaboration, attracts talent, and achieves administrational efficiencies, but also drives urban regeneration and creates activity and vitality for the city centres," the place brief said.
The 40,295-square-metre Kingston site is the last undeveloped block on the foreshore, surrounding the heritage-registered powerhouse and former transport depot. A restoration of the powerhouse, now home to the Canberra Glassworks, was completed in 2007.
Photo Access, an arts organisations due to move into the Kingston precinct, this week released a five-year strategic plan which said a purpose-built home would quadruple its space and include a darkroom, studios, a 300-square-metre gallery and access to artists' accommodation.
"Photo Access is proud to be one of the six organisations projected to move to the new world-class arts precinct being constructed in Kingston by 2026-27 offering photo access the facilities and space to fulfil its demonstrated potential," the organisation said in a strategic plan.
M16 Artspace said in its 2022 annual report it had a "new move-in date of late 2025" and had submitted its "revised functional brief, outlining our needs and requirements as an organisation that facilitates a large range of artistic practices and outputs".
Craft ACT and Canberra Contemporary Art Space will also move into the precinct, alongside Megalo Print Studio.
In November 2021, the ACT government terminated a contract with developer Geocon to deliver the arts precinct, nearly five years after the company was named the site's preferred tenderer. The site was first put on the market in 2015.
Geocon and the ACT government signed an agreement for the project in July 2019, after protracted negotiations pushed back the scheduled start of construction by more than a year.
Construction was originally due to begin in early 2019.
