Drought-Resilience Scholarship awardee’s work highly commended at 2026 Victorian Museums and Galleries Awards

 

Stephanie Rosestone’s Museum of Future Water recognised at Victorian awards

 

Vic Hub Drought Resilience Scholarship awardee Stephanie Rosestone has been recognised at the 2026 Victorian Museums and Galleries Awards for her project, Museum of Future Water.

The Museum of Future Water was highly commended in the Volunteer-run Project of The Year category at the awards, which were announced at the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art on Tuesday 28 April. The 2026 awards received more than 70 nominations from across Victoria’s museums, galleries and community-collecting organisations, with 21 awards presented on the night.

Public Galleries Association of Victoria (PGAV) Executive Officer Anne Robertson said this year’s awards demonstrated the “extraordinary programming” being presented by galleries and museums across Victoria, including deeply local and culturally distinctive experiences for communities across the state.

The Australian Museums and Galleries Association (AMaGA) Victoria Executive Director Dr Ashley Robertson said creative and cultural organisations were “at the heart of our communities”, with nominees demonstrating the power of museums and galleries to enrich lives, spark connection and drive social and economic wellbeing.

Stephanie said, “I am thankful to the Vic Hub for supporting my research project and the award nomination. The future of water will touch everyone, and so collaboration across sectors, communities and areas of interest is so important.

“The Museum of Future Water is designed to be a place where everyone can imagine together. The exhibition at Mooroopna shared different futures as imagined by community members. While there were a wide range of futures on display, they shared a common thread – a sense of care about what happens next. From this project I learnt how much more important care and collaboration about the future is than trying to predict what will happen. Creating possibilities and navigating uncertainty together is how we will adapt to changing water futures.”

 

Stephanie’s research

 

Stephanie was one of five researchers awarded the inaugural Vic Hub Drought Resilience Scholarship in 2024. Her scholarship-supported research explores critical and creative futures thinking, with a focus on water-related issues in the Murray-Darling Basin and how futures-thinking skills can support resilience, adaptation and transformation in the face of uncertain water futures.

Through her research, Stephanie has worked with north-central Victorian land and water managers to explore how creative, participatory approaches can support stronger community understanding and cross-agency collaboration around complex regional challenges.

The recognition of Museum of Future Water highlights the value of bringing creative practice, community learning and drought-resilience research together in ways that help people explore future water challenges from new perspectives.

 

Learn more

 

Learn more about Stephanie’s project, ‘Embracing complex water futures together: critical futures thinking, creative imaginaries and co-production’. 

Explore the Museum of Future Water.