The City of Geelong

Coastal creativity

Victoria's second largest city, and one of the fastest growing regions in the state, is just over an hour's drive south-west from Melbourne.

Located on Corio Bay, and gateway to the Bellarine Peninsula and world-famous Great Ocean Road, Geelong is a great base from which to discover a range of cultural gems from contemporary commercial art galleries and performing arts to the major collection of its regional gallery and over 100 National Trust properties. And local artist, Jan Mitchell, has created more than 100 large sculptured bollards representing characters from the city's past and present which are scattered along the Geelong foreshore.

Just a few of the many cultural highlights of this fascinating region include:

• The Geelong Art Gallery, which has a collection of over 4400 works of art focusing on Australian contemporary art, art of the Geelong region, colonial silver, British art and European ceramics and includes Frederick McCubbin's masterpiece A Bush Burial and Eugene von Guerard's The Barter.
• The National Wool Museum, located in an historic 1872 wool store, which tells the story of Australia's wool-growing heritage.
• The Geelong Performing Arts Centre which presents a wide range of theatrical and musical performances, events and exhibitions in a number of theatres and spaces for adults and children.
• The Courthouse Youth Arts Centre which provides a platform for young, emerging artists, and Back to Back Theatre which works predominantly with community members with disabilities in the local community and all over the world, both of which are located in the Courthouse building.