Contemporary textiles set to delight

Published on 16 June 2026

The award-winning Wangaratta Art Gallery continues its commitment to presenting outstanding contemporary textile art from across Australia with a new exhibition by Sydney-based artist Ali Noble.

In her exhibition Nothing is certain, said The Curtain, Ali Noble has created hand‑sewn, padded and vividly coloured textile works that reimagine the legacy of modernist interior designer Lilly Reich whose experimental use of curtains challenged architectural expectations of permanence, certainty, and rationality. Noble reflects on these ideas through her own experience of working with fabric and textiles. She draws on the softness, movement, and sensuality of curtains and padded forms to explore themes of domestic labour, motherhood, intimacy, and enchantment.

Ali Noble explains:

“This personal reconfiguring of Lilly Reich’s curtains and furniture inNothing is certain, said The Curtain emerged as a sensual folly, a collaboration with Reich’s legacy of playful and innovative design. It is a tribute not only to Reich’s overlooked contribution to modernist architecture, but an engagement with the intricacies of the fabrication process. In particular, communication and collaboration. Thus, this exhibition was made possible through the combined skills of an architect, carpenter, welder, upholsterer, and artist.”

Wangaratta Art Gallery Director, Rachel Arndt says:

“We’re always so excited to showcase cutting-edge contemporary textile art, and Ali Noble’s textile forms and concepts are certainly pioneering. This exhibition offers our audiences an opportunity to see textile art in a new way, being both playful and scholarly, and offering plenty of opportunity for discovery.”

Noble has an extensive history of exhibiting in artist-run-initiatives, institutions and commercial spaces throughout Australia. She holds a Master of Fine Art from Sydney College of the Arts, University of Sydney, where she was awarded a Fauvette Loureiro Travel Scholarship, and the David Harold Tribe Postgraduate Research Fellowship (Sculpture).

Nothing is certain, said The Curtain opens to the public on Saturday 20 June with an opening celebration held on Friday 26 June from 5.30pm at Wangaratta Art Gallery.

An opening celebration will also be held for ever popular Petite Miniature Textiles 2026 at the same time on Friday 26 June at 5.30pm. Petite curator and artist Cara Johnson will speak at the event.

The exhibition will be on display until 16 August 2026.