 The gallery showed work by nationally prominent artists as well as artists associated with the Hunter Region of New South Wales, including still-life painter Margaret Olley (1923-2011), landscape drawer Shay Docking (1928-1998), mid-century modernist painter and textile designer Mary Beeston (b.1917), naïve artist Virginia Geyl (b. Holland 1917- d.1999) and the surrealist/religious painter Rona Scott, who created a mural for the film Tommy when it came to Australia.Anne Von Bertouch was awarded honorary master's degrees by the universities of Newcastle and New England and was awarded a medal in the Order of Australia in 1979.