His comments come as the Sydney Morning Herald reveals the NSW government will allocate $100 million for a new Regional Cultural Fund in next week’s budget.

Mr Smee, who moved from Sydney to the United States in 2008 to become the art critic for the Boston Globe, says regional galleries are “incredibly important” in bridging the gap between artists and the community.

“I think a lot of artists feel frustrated at the disconnect between the big museums … and what they do themselves in the studio,” he says.

“Regional galleries are the ones who help bridge that divide. I think they play a really important role in the whole ecosystem by giving local artists a chance to show and be more ambitious, to get their work out of the studio, out of the commercial galleries into a more public setting.”

He describes Newcastle Art Gallery as “one of the more ambitious, energetic and active galleries anywhere in this country”. 

For more than a decade, the gallery’s redevelopment has been a focus of community discussion and political debate. A funding plan for the project collapsed in 2013, but there’s hope the proposal can be revived. 

Lord Mayor Nuatali Nelmes recently met with NSW Arts Minister Don Harwin in the gallery. "The art gallery redevelopment is a very worthy, shovel-ready project that meets all the criteria of the NSW Government cultural infrastructure fund,” Cr Nelmes says. 

While a spokesman for the Minister says Mr Harwin is waiting for a revised pitch from the council, it has been revealed the government will promise $100 million for the new Regional Cultural Fund in the budget. The fund will support construction or upgrade of galleries, theatres, libraries, museums and halls, Deputy Premier John Barilaro says.

While not talking specifically about Newcastle Art Gallery’s redevelopment, Mr Smee says it is an issue not confined to this city.

“Given how affluent Australians have been over a long time now and how well-educated people are, and how much interest there is in art, it seems there could be a bit more support for museums, and for some of these kinds of expansions that in most cases seem like a pretty good idea,” he says. 

Mr Smee won the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 2011. His most recent book is The Art of Rivalry. In his lecture at the gallery on Thursday at 6.30pm, Mr Smee will talk about two of the artists featured in his book, Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon.

“It’s a really dramatic story, which I loved researching and writing about, so hopefully I can interest the audience as well, Mr Smee says.”