Bridging Now to Next #NRW2025
Reconciliation in the visual arts requires centring and empowering First Nations arts, culture, and leadership through action and structural change.
The theme for National Reconciliation Week 2025, Bridging Now to Next, calls on all of us to reflect on the journey of reconciliation so far and take meaningful action towards a just and equitable future.
For the visual arts sector, reconciliation means ensuring that First Nations arts and culture are not just acknowledged, but actively centered, valued, and led by First Nations artists and communities. It means moving from recognition to rights, from commitments to action, and from symbolic gestures to structural change.
At NAVA, we are working to deepen our commitment through our Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP), a plan that focuses on embedding long-term, systemic change within our policies, programs, and advocacy. We know we still have a long way to go, and we are listening, learning, and striving to do better in how we support First Nations artists and communities.
As part of our ongoing learning, NAVA recently participated in Envisioning Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander AI Futures, a national gathering that imagined what the next 10 years could look like if First Nations leadership, data sovereignty and cultural protocols were upheld in AI. Read the Communique.
We encourage everyone in the sector to reflect on what reconciliation means in practice and take tangible steps to support First Nations artists and cultural workers. This includes:
- Buying First Nations art from ethical sources, including First Nations-owned businesses, art centres, and independent artists.
- Upholding First Nations cultural protocols in exhibitions, commissions, and collaborations.
- Supporting stronger protections for Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property (ICIP), especially as AI-generated content raises new challenges.
- Ensuring First Nations-led decision-making in arts policy, governance, and funding.
- Educating ourselves and others about First Nations histories, cultures, and rights in the arts.
As part of our ongoing learning, we encourage artists, curators, and institutions to engage with First Nations-led resources:
- NAVA Code of Practice – First Nations Guidelines
- NAVA Code of Practice - Working with First Nations Art Centres
- Creative Australia’s First Nations Cultural Protocols
Reconciliation is not just about a single week – it is an ongoing process of truth-telling, learning, and structural change. As we reflect on Bridging Now to Next, we acknowledge the work still to be done and commit to continuing the conversation beyond NRW.
About the theme
The National Reconciliation Week (NRW) 2025 theme, Bridging Now to Next, reflects the ongoing connection between past, present and future.
Bridging Now to Next urges us to look ahead and continue the push forward as past lessons guide us.
At a time when Australia faces uncertainty in its reconciliation journey, this theme calls on all Australians to step forward together.
In the #NRW2025 theme artwork created by Kalkadoon woman Bree Buttenshaw, native plants − known for regenerating after fire and thriving through adversity − symbolise our collective strength and the possibilities of renewal. This is a time for growth, reflection, and commitment to walking together.
Australia’s history of reconciliation is not a linear one but one that includes both great strides and disappointing setbacks.
Twenty-five years ago, Corroboree 2000 brought together Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and non-Indigenous leaders in a historic call for reconciliation. We continue that work in 2025, inviting all Australians to join us in Bridging Now to Next – building a more united and respectful nation.
Corroboree 2000 and the Sydney Harbour Bridge walk were significant events in our long journey and our determination to continue that journey towards a reconciled Australia and justice for First Nations peoples is unstoppable.
The #NRW2025 theme was created in collaboration with Little Rocket, a First Nations owned and operated marketing and creative agency.
More assets, activity, and information will be released in February 2025. Keep an eye on the National Reconciliation Week page for updates.
Image credit
Kaylene Whiskey & the Iwantja Young Women’s Film Project, Kungka Kunpu, 2019. Single channel digital video with sound, 4 mins 6 sec.
Currently showing at Fremantle Arts Centre as part of It's Always Been Always, an exhibition which centres the voices of Blak women, celebrating their powerful connections to Country, Community, and Culture. Curated by Zali Morgan.
Featuring newly commissioned and existing works by Wendy Hubert (Yindjibarndi – Juluwarlu Art Group), Harriette Bryant (Pitjantjatjara – Mimili Maku Arts), Kaylene Whiskey & the Iwantja Young Women’s Film Project (Yankunytjatjara – Iwantja Arts), Jazz Money (Wiradjuri and Irish), Yabini Kickett (Bibulmun/Noongar), and Amanda Bell (Badimia and Yued Noongar). Exhibition continues until 3 August 2025.
ID: A photo of four people standing on rocky ground with dry shrubs, with smoke-like lines drawn coming out of their hands.
The National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA) is a national organisation whose staff and Board, as well as the artists, arts workers and organisations we represent, are based across hundreds of sovereign nations and unceded lands throughout the continent that has become colonially known as Australia.
We pay our deepest respects to all First Nations communities' ancestors and Elders.
Sovereignty was never ceded.
Always was, always will be Aboriginal land.
