Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus wins the 2026 Out Front People’s Choice Award at Manly Art Gallery & Museum with her evocative painting inspired by the Blue Mountains.
Late afternoon light drifts across the harbour foreshore in Manly, filtering through the tall windows of Manly Art Gallery & Museum. Inside, the rooms are calm but attentive, visitors moving slowly between works created not by seasoned professionals, but by students at the edge of their creative lives.
Among the paintings, sculptures, and experimental media that fill the walls, one work quietly gathers people around it. The painting is titled A Sunday Afternoon at Hartley. Its maker, Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus, is part of a new generation of artists emerging from Sydney’s Northern Beaches.
During the 2026 Out Front Exhibition, the painting would go on to capture the imagination of visitors, ultimately earning Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus the KALOF People’s Choice Award. Yet the work itself does not announce its success loudly. Instead, it invites viewers into a slower, more contemplative space.
Mia Nethery Of Mackellar Girls Campus And A Landscape Remembered
The painting that earned Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus the award draws its inspiration from the rugged quiet of the Blue Mountains. The small village of Hartley – where colonial stone buildings sit against a backdrop of hills and shifting sky – becomes the emotional centre of the piece.
Rather than depicting a single moment, Mia’s painting feels layered with memory. Soft glazes of oil paint build depth across the surface, using techniques inspired by the traditional Flemish method. The result is subtle but atmospheric: a landscape that seems to exist somewhere between observation and recollection.
In A Sunday Afternoon at Hartley, the countryside appears calm, yet slightly distant. The viewer senses both the comfort of retreat and the quiet solitude that comes with it.
For Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus, the painting reflects an interest in how place and identity intersect – how landscapes become repositories for personal memory.
The Out Front Exhibition And The Rise Of Young Artists
Now in its 32nd year, the Out Front Exhibition at Manly Art Gallery & Museum has become an important moment in the creative calendar of Sydney’s Northern Beaches.
Each year, the exhibition gathers a selection of outstanding Higher School Certificate artworks from local schools. Paintings hang alongside sculpture, digital video, mixed media installations, and intricate drawings. The works are diverse in style but connected by a shared moment in time: students completing one of the most significant creative projects of their school years.
For many young artists, Out Front represents their first experience exhibiting in a professional gallery environment.
Visitors move through the exhibition not only to admire technique, but to witness the ideas shaping the next generation. The works often explore themes of identity, landscape, technology, and belonging – subjects that feel both immediate and quietly universal.
This year’s exhibition sparked particular interest from the local community. Over the course of the show, 1,344 votes were cast by visitors selecting their favourite work.
When the final tally was announced, Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus had emerged as the clear People’s Choice winner.
Mia Nethery Of Mackellar Girls Campus And A Community Response
The People’s Choice Award, sponsored by the youth initiative KALOF (Keep A Lookout For), carries a modest prize of $500. Yet its real significance lies in the response it represents.
Unlike curated prizes decided by panels or critics, the People’s Choice Award reflects the quiet conversations happening inside the gallery itself. Visitors pause in front of a work, return to it, talk about it with friends, and finally cast their vote.
In the case of Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus, the response suggests that her painting resonated widely.
According to Sue Heins, the exhibition highlights the depth of creativity nurtured in local schools.
“It’s wonderful to see our young people expressing themselves so powerfully through art,” she noted when announcing the result. “Mia’s work is a testament to the creativity and depth found in our local schools.”
Her comments reflect a broader sense of pride within the community – an acknowledgement of the teachers, mentors, and institutions that support emerging artists across the Northern Beaches.
From Mackellar Girls Campus To The Gallery Walls
For Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus, the journey from classroom studio to gallery exhibition follows a familiar but meaningful path taken by many young artists.
Schools like Mackellar Girls Campus play a vital role in fostering creative exploration. Within art rooms scattered across Sydney’s suburbs, students experiment with mediums, refine their visual language, and begin to discover how personal stories can be expressed through form and colour.
The transition from school to gallery allows those explorations to meet a wider audience.
Standing quietly among the other works in the Out Front exhibition, Mia’s painting becomes part of a larger conversation – one about landscape, memory, and the evolving voice of young Australian artists.
It is a reminder that the early stages of artistic life are often shaped by community spaces: classrooms, local galleries, and small exhibitions where emerging talent first meets public attention.
Event Details
Out Front 2026 Exhibition
Location: Manly Art Gallery & Museum
Address:
West Esplanade Reserve
Manly
Featuring: HSC artworks from Northern Beaches students including Mia Nethery of Mackellar Girls Campus
Official Information: https://www.northernbeaches.nsw.gov.au/things-to-do/arts-and-culture/manly-art-gallery-museum/exhibitions/exhibition-catalogues-resources/out-front-2026