Professor Gerard Vaughan, from Melbourne University and the Australian Institute of Art History, is visiting the Hamilton Art Gallery for the free public lecture.

Professor Vaughan’s illustrious career across the arts culminated in a 13-year appointment as director of the National Gallery of Victoria.

Australia Felix Museum of Arts, Culture and History group spokesman Leighton Wraith said the visit was an important opportunity for all interested in Hamilton’s future to listen and learn from an inspiring figure of the arts.

“We want to inform people in south-west Victoria of the possibilities there are if you embrace arts as not only part of culture but economic strategy,” he said.

“We’ve had three of these conversations, this is the fourth and each is catering to different aspects of what arts can achieve if we embrace them.

“Gerard Vaughan has had an extraordinary career.

“He transformed the National Gallery of Victoria from its size of collection and from its economic base.

“That has proved a well-organised gallery can do what we hope to achieve up here. We hope he’ll have a lot of lessons for us.”

The talk will be held at the Hamilton Art Gallery tomorrow from 7.30pm.