The National Archives of Australia is pleased to announce that the national tour of its latest exhibition will begin in Hobart to mark the start of the city’s annual summer festival.

Summers Past: Golden Days in the Sun 1950 to 1970 is an exhibition that should gently stir memories of idyllic summers spent by the beach, and will open at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery at midday on Friday 1st December.

The Archives’ Advisory Council is also meeting in Hobart on that day, and is delighted that Summers Past will be the first official exhibition to be staged in the revamped ground floor of the gallery’s historic Commissariat Building.

Summers Past is a touring exhibition from the National Archives with 75 summer images from its vast collection of Australian News and Information Bureau photographs.  The exhibition will be the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery’s main contribution to the summer festival, and follows on from recent collaborations between the two cultural institutions – Antarctica: Treaty Territory and the Tasmanian Built Heritage seminars.

The Summers Past photographs are just a tiny taste of the way exhibitions can motivate and even inspire people, and illustrate the value of the Archives’ amazing collection of more than 50 million items.  The Archives has been developing touring exhibitions since 1993.

Members of the National Archives Advisory Council will attend the opening of Summers Past and be available for any photo opportunities.  The council comprises Mr Paul Santamaria SC (chairman), Ms Barbara Belcher, Senator the Hon. John Faulkner, Mr Peter Grant, Mr Ian Hancock, Mr Roland Perry, Mr Tony Rutherford, the Hon. Alex Somlyay MP, Dr Jane Wilson, and Mr Allan Taylor AM.

Each year the council aims to meet at least once out of Canberra as this helps ensure that its members have a direct opportunity to interact with those interested in the work of the National Archives.

Summers Past will be on display at TMAG until February 2007.