Participate as an artist
The South Australian Living Artists (SALA) Festival is a state-wide celebration of visual art made up of exhibitions and events that takes place every August.
All kinds of visual artists are celebrated – young, old, emerging, established, traditional, contemporary – and a range of visual art forms are represented. Painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, ceramics, jewellery, glass, moving image, textile, papercraft, printmaking, metalwork, furniture, and more. The Festival is ‘open access’, meaning that it is not curated – anyone can take part if they are a living South Australian visual artist.
Another feature of the Festival is that it activates both traditional art spaces (like galleries), but also non-traditional spaces (such as cafes, pubs, hospitals, shop windows, wineries, and more). This is how the Festival is able to have such great reach – hundreds of exhibitions are independently organised in a variety of spaces, then registered as part of the Festival.
Thinking about taking part?
Read on below for the step-by-step process.
Registrations will open on 1 March and close on 14 May, 2025.
Step 1 - Check your eligibility
Are you South Australian?
Are you a visual artist?
Film, theatre, and music are generally considered to be outside of the Festival scope.
Solo or group exhibition?
Step 2 - Find a venue & get in touch
Use your Networks
use the Venue Finder
Just Ask
found a space?
Step 3 - Agree on details & get them in writing
Open Dates
The exhibition only has to be viewable by the public for one day during August to be eligible to be registered in the Festival.
who will do the Admin?
(We recommend you do this)
Open Hours
eg: 9am-5pm Mon-Fri,
2-4pm every 2nd Sat,
etc. These can be narrower than actual business hours if preferred.
Fee
Install
Insurance
Do you have public liability insurance in case your artwork falls and hurts someone?
Opening Event
You do not have to have an opening night event, but if you would like to, agree on some key details beforehand. Eg staffing, times, set-up, food, drinks, speeches.
Is the artwork for sale?
Step 4 - Admin
May
submit the registration form by May Deadline
1 Mar - 14 May 2025.
Ensure that you receive a confirmation email.
check for rebates
Apply for the Awards
Let your friends know!
July
SALA Program goes live
Step 5 - Action
receive promo pack
finish making the work
Install
(It sometimes takes longer than anticipated).
enjoy
let us know how you went
Key dates for 2025
Monday 20 January
Artist & Venue Noticeboard open
Saturday 1 March
Registrations open
Most awards open
Monday 7 April, midnight*
Early Bird pricing ends
Sunday 28 April, midnight*
Artist & Venue Noticeboard closes
Wednesday 14 May, midnight*
Registrations close
Wednesday 21 May, midnight*
Most Awards close
1 – 31 August 2025
SALA Festival
Saturday 16 – Sunday 17 August
Open Studios Weekend
* SALA staff will be available to support registrations and applications up until 5pm, Monday to Friday.
Frequently Asked Questions
SALA is an ‘open access’ festival, which means that anyone can take part.
The festival takes an ‘umbrella’ format, where artists independently organise to exhibit their artwork somewhere in South Australia during August, and then register their event with SALA to officially become part of the Festival.
The visual arts encompass painting, drawing, sculpture, glass, textiles, ceramics, printmaking, photographic art, moving image soundscapes, digital art, performance art, installation, and more!
Theatre, music, and dance generally aren’t able to be part of the SALA Festival, unless these activities support a visual arts event.
If you are unsure about whether your work will be able to be part of the Festival, please contact the SALA team who will be glad to discuss this with you.
No, you just need to live or reside in South Australia.
No. You can only register an event if you have found somewhere to exhibit and have absolutely confirmed this / the venue is committed to this plan.
Please note that online exhibitions are a valid form of display in SALA Festival.
You can find more information about the cost to register, and available council rebates in the Registration Fees and Council Rebates section of our website.
In 2025 you can pay less for your registration if you submit your completed SALA Festival registration form before midnight Mon 7 April 2025 (when Earlybird pricing ends).
Each year, several local councils support artists and venues participating in SALA by subsiding partial or whole registration fees. This scheme acknowledges the role that artists and local venues play in the cultural life of the council area. See the Council Rebates page for a full list of participating councils.
If your council has not listed a rebate offer, please contact them directly to ask whether they can offer this service.
A studio is the space where an artist creates their artwork. SALA is a great time to invite the general public to see the spaces where artists work, either by opening up the space to the public or by recording a tour of the space and sharing it online.
Please note, if you are working from a shared studio space it is best practice to confirm the Open Studio event with other tenants, and ensure that they are aware of the associated dates (in case they want to prepare, or don’t want to be involved).
Each year SALA highlights the registered open studios over the Open Studios Weekend. If you are registering an Open Studio, consider trying to align your open dates with this particular weekend. The 2025 SALA Open Studios Weekend will fall on Saturday 16 – Sunday 17 August.
We love an unconventional idea!
As long as your event incorporates living South Australian visual artists, please consider registering it.
If you would like help or feedback with your idea, get in contact with us!
To participate in SALA Festival, artists must find a venue to exhibit in (or exhibit online).
We created the SALA Artist & Venue Noticeboard to help artists and venues find each other.
Artists can create a profile that will appear on the Available Artists List, where potential venues can see your work and reach out if interested in exhibiting your work during SALA.
You can also browse the Available Venues List (but please note that this list is not exhaustive, and is constantly changing).
We also strongly encourage artists to use their personal and/or professional networks to find a venue that they might have a connection to.
Unfortunately, SALA does not have the resources to find venues for artists. This is why we created the Artist & Venue Noticeboard.
Online exhibitions are a valid form of display in the SALA Festival.
Please note that online exhibitions will need to be hosted independently (just like a physical exhibition does). Registering in the SALA Festival gets you a listing in the SALA Program, which acts as a directory rather than a host site.
If you’re wanting to put on an online exhibition but not sure which platform to use, think about what you actually want to do first. If you’re presenting a body of work through photographs/images, maybe you could use Wix or a virtual gallery like artsteps. If you want to make an artist talk, maybe a narrated PowerPoint slideshow on YouTube or an audio recording on Soundcloud is more appropriate.
It is the responsibility of the artist and the venue to secure adequate public liability insurance. This insurance covers the risk of a member of the public injuring themselves through the action of the artist or the venue (eg, an artwork falling off a wall and injuring someone).
You may also seek contents insurance to cover equipment/art work within the space against being damaged for the duration of the exhibition.
For insurance advice and short term cover for your SALA exhibition contact SALA partners City Rural Insurance on 8272 7785 / cityrural.net.au
Absolutely! There are no restrictions on how many exhibitions or events an artist can exhibit in. However, each new project will need a new registration.
Artists that are registered in the SALA Festival are encouraged to apply for the SALA Awards & Opportunities.
Read up on the different awards and opportunities and their eligibility criteria on the SALA Awards page, and be sure to complete an application form via the SALA Online Portal before the close of applications. (midnight Wed 21 May 2025 for most awards & opportunities)
Got more questions?
Head to our resources page (look for our Participation Resource (PDF) in particular!)
Or contact the SALA Festival team
(08) 7077 0011 / [email protected]
