A childhood dream opens its doors on Kent Street

Published on 19 October 2026

Story: Lizzie Macaulay, Bigger Picture Business Solutions. Photo: Cody Fox, Cleva Media

For Lee-Ann Handley, a gallery of her own began as a childhood dream and has grown into a life's work. The artist and arts educator behind Kent Street Studio in Maryborough traces her love of art to her own school days, and to a teacher who saw something in her. "I've always loved art since I was a child," she says. "I was blessed to have an amazing art teacher, Christine Pritchard, at Riverside Girls High School, who inspired my love of art."

Her own practice today is multidisciplinary, though she returns most often to the Australian landscape, which she paints in both an expressive and an abstract style. Alongside her making, more than thirty years of teaching have kept her close to young artists finding their feet. She describes working with teenagers as a privilege, meeting them at an age when they are still exploring their identity and building their self-esteem. "My focus is on teaching confidence with creativity," she says. What she hopes each student carries away is simple. "A love of art," she says. "I always teach everyone as if they were my daughter, always wanting the best for them, in the same way a mother always wants the best for her children."

That instinct to nurture other people's creativity has shaped much of her working life. Before Kent Street Studio, Lee-Ann founded and ran Youth Arts Yeppoon, a not-for-profit she gave almost five years to, along with her own time and money. It ran monthly artist-run workshops aimed at encouraging creative practice among young people, a cause she remains deeply passionate about. Both ventures sit under the banner of Collective Creations, the business name she has used across a range of art initiatives over the years. The through line, in her words, is a passion for "celebrating art and artists, regardless of whether the artist is a student, emerging or established."

Kent Street Studio is the fullest expression of that dream so far. For now the focus is on the gallery downstairs, with the upstairs photography studio due to be completed in 2027. Lee-Ann sees art and photography as closely linked, and counts it good fortune to have both able to exist under one roof. "I feel art and photography have a symbiotic relationship," she says. More than anything, she wants the space to feel open to all. The studio, she says, has become an inclusive, welcoming place in the community for artists and art lovers alike.

Right now, that welcome reaches artists from well beyond Maryborough. Kent Street Studio is hosting the Kent Street Studio Art Prize, an annual award Lee-Ann had planned long before the gallery opened its doors. The aim was to give artists, locally and nationally, the chance to exhibit their work in a commercial gallery on the Fraser Coast. Entries were open to two-dimensional, three-dimensional and digital work, with $1000 going to the winner. The prize drew 72 entries, and Lee-Ann is impressed by both their standard and their range. "We are extremely impressed with the high standard of all 72 of the entries," she says, pointing to the variety of genre, media and subject matter. "The spirit of the prize is a celebration of creativity, which I believe all art embodies. The criterion for the prize is contemporary, resolved and significant."

The prize reflects a wider ambition. Lee-Ann wants to see Maryborough's arts and culture gain national and international recognition, and she is just as keen to bring accomplished artists from elsewhere into the community to share their work and expertise. It is the same impulse that has run through her career, whether the artist in front of her is a teenager in a classroom or an established name.

The exhibition opened on Friday 9 October, launched by Fraser Coast Mayor George Seymour, with artist Carole Elliott travelling down from Yeppoon to speak. The works remain on show until the end of November, so there is still time to see the field for yourself.

For Lee-Ann, all of it belongs to a life she believes should be guided by service. Her commitment to the arts and to creativity is, she says, her life purpose, the thing that gives her work meaning and a sense of legacy. She is quick to add that none of it is hers alone. Kent Street Studio is not a solo venture, she says, crediting its collectors, her partner Craig Glesson, and friends who go above and beyond to help. Between them, they have turned a child's dream of a gallery into a place where creativity, in all its forms, is celebrated.

The Kent Street Studio Art Prize exhibition is on show at Kent Street Studio, 345 Kent St, Maryborough, until Sunday 29 November. The gallery is open Wednesday to Saturday, 9am to 5pm.

This story appears in the November 2026 edition of Fraser Coast Scene, our monthly guide to What's On across our Cultural Services venues.