Powerhouse has today announced ‘Task Eternal’ as the landmark opening exhibition for the highly anticipated opening of Powerhouse Parramatta in late 2026.
It will be one of the most ambitious aerospace exhibitions ever staged in the world.
The announcement was made at the Sydney launch of the International Astronautical Congress 2025, confirming that the exhibition will launch the new museum with a bold curatorial and architectural vision that places western Sydney at the forefront of global cultural and scientific dialogue.
The exhibition reflects the scale and ambition of Powerhouse Parramatta and the NSW Government’s investment in science, culture and innovation. Developed with international and local collaborators, including the Australian Space Agency and other international agencies such as the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum alongside artists, researchers, First Nations communities, and industry leaders, Task Eternal is a significant international exhibition and major statement of cultural, scientific and creative collaboration.
Developed over four years, ‘Task Eternal’ is an expansive and immersive exhibition tracing humanity’s enduring quest to defy gravity, take flight and journey into space – from First Nations sky knowledges and early aviation to cutting-edge aerospace innovation, ethics and speculative futures. The exhibition will be presented in the museum’s largest exhibition space, PS1, with an 18-metre height and more than 2,200 square metres of exhibition space.
‘Task Eternal’ brings together over 600 objects, including items from the Powerhouse Collection and loans from leading local and international science and cultural institutions including the British Museum, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, space agencies and start-ups across 12 countries — including the USA, UK, Germany, Switzerland, France, Italy, Japan, Thailand, Korea and India — alongside 16 major new artist commissions by Australian and international artists.
The exhibition’s design has been developed in partnership with acclaimed Beijing-based OPEN Architecture, led by Li Hu and Huang Wenjing. Drawing inspiration from Ted Chiang’s science fiction short story The Tower of Babylon, the exhibition invites visitors on an ascending journey through four acts — Skyward, Power, Off-Earth and The Return — before returning them to Earth. A newly commissioned essay by Chiang will be featured throughout the exhibition.
As a museum of applied arts and sciences, Powerhouse has long stood at the intersection of technology, creativity and community. Task Eternal amplifies this legacy by rejecting a single authoritative narrative and platforming a plurality of voices — from astronauts, artists and engineers to Elders, scientists and speculative writers. It reflects the institution’s ongoing commitment to collaboration, innovation and access, and its belief that museums must work in the service of community and industry as repositories of knowledge and as active sites of cultural exchange and critique.
Powerhouse Chief Executive Lisa Havilah said: “From the vantage point of the southern hemisphere, ‘Task Eternal’ uses the motif of flight to investigate the technological, political, cultural and environmental motivations – and impacts – of leaving the ground, connecting it with individual personal stories of connecting with the sky across countries and generations.”
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