The Children’s Sensorium brings kid-focused art to Pinnacles Gallery

Pinnacles Gallery has been taken over by an explosion of colour with The Children’s Sensorium touring exhibition arriving in Townsville.

The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) art experience is an immersive installation developed by RMIT School of Art Professor Dr Grace McQuilten in conjunction with artists, Elders and mental health researchers. The Children’s Sensorium encourages children and their families to explore their senses, including touch, sound, smell and movement.

Townsville Acting Mayor Ann-Maree Greaney said the exhibition would be an outstanding experience for Townsville youngsters to explore their emotional wellbeing.

“The Children’s Sensorium is a fun, free and inclusive exhibition for children to process their feelings through exploring their senses and using their imagination. It’s colourful and absolutely captivating inside Pinnacles Gallery at the moment as the team puts the finishing touches on installing this incredible exhibition,” Cr Greaney said.

“I think this exhibition is going to be a big hit with families, which is so important to Council. As the arts capital of Northern Australia we’re always looking to bring engaging world-class exhibitions to Townsville for the benefit of Townsville locals and visitors to our city.”

Dr Grace McQuilten said the exhibition was created following the COVID-19 pandemic.

“During the pandemic and prolonged lockdowns, my gorgeous daughter developed anxiety for the first time. When we went to seek out help, we realised very quickly that mental health services were absolutely inundated. That made it clear to me that there was a crisis in the challenge of mental health for children during the pandemic and also in service delivery,” Dr McQuilten said.

“That made me think, what would be a strength-based, creative and arts-focused response to this situation?

“Together with the artists and N’arwee’t Carolyn Briggs, we worked as a team to create the sensorium, which was a space where children could explore their senses … and to do that with a really creative and fun way that would connect them with nature and Country.

“We found a lot of families would come in … they would stay for hours or the whole day. Some families came back four or five more times to experience it.

“There’s a whole range of interesting and potentially really significant outcomes from the research and we’re excited to look at how the principles of the sensorium could be used by a whole range of different communities.”

The Children’s Sensorium until 8 March 2026 at Pinnacles Gallery, Riverway. For more information, visit the event on What's On Townsville.