Inside China Heights, The Sydney Gallery Putting Artists Front And Centre
For art's sake
By Kiri Johnston | 14th August 2026For more than two decades, Nina Treffkorn and Edward Woodley have built China Heights around artists, lasting relationships and a belief that good work deserves time to evolve.
There is something fitting about having to climb three flights of stairs to arrive at China Heights. Tucked above Foster Street in Surry Hills, the independent gallery and studio has been exhibiting contemporary Australian and international artists since opening in 2004.
For founders and directors Nina Treffkorn and Edward Woodley, that independence runs deeper than the space itself. Both grew up with artist parents, in homes where creative expression was simply part of everyday life.
“Growing up that way gave me an incredible, natural confidence in my creative output,” Nina says. “I have never had any apprehension or fear of expressing myself, as we were taught and encouraged to do so from a young age.” It is something she has consciously passed on to her own sons.
“Art should be created from sincerity, and not with any other intention than for it to exist within itself,” Edward says. “Art for art’s sake.”
Edward is also a multidisciplinary artist, working across painting, sculpture and installation, with a practice informed by the visual language of urban life and the structures that influence how people move through and interpret the world around them.
Playing the long game
Running a gallery inevitably changes the way you look at art. Where Edward was once excited by the immediate impact of a great exhibition, today he is more interested in what an artist might build over time.
“I am excited by artists who have the patience and vision to think long-term,” he says. “Someone committed to building a sustained career rather than just a single moment.”
That long-term thinking shapes the way China Heights operates. Exhibitions are mapped out around 18 months in advance, giving artists time to develop new ideas while Nina and Edward build an audience around the work.
“Running a gallery is quite accurately seen as a hybrid of luxury retail and talent management,” Edward says. Talent, though, is only part of what they look for. For Nina, the qualities that can sustain an artist across decades are often the ones that can’t be taught. “Self-discipline and steadiness, alongside exceptional talent,” she says. “It is what ultimately makes all the difference in their career.”
When work and life become one
Their own partnership has endured alongside the gallery. Nina and Edward work together, curate together and share a home.
“We don’t consciously separate anything,” Nina says. “Our work and personal lives are completely interlinked, a symbiotic relationship where everything flows from one thing to another.”
Their different backgrounds have inevitably influenced one another. Nina credits Edward with giving her an understanding of the Australian zeitgeist and, significantly, First Nations art. Edward, meanwhile, says Nina’s European upbringing has broadened his international perspective.
Those complementary instincts can also be seen in the artists China Heights represents, including Style cover artist Shaun Daniel Allen (Shal), whose connection with the gallery began after he moved from Queensland to Sydney.
Finding Shal
Nina and Edward met Shal through mutual friends and artists, with Edward remembering him as “gentle and introspective” — qualities he believes are reflected in the emotional intelligence of his work.
As Shal began painting from the China Heights studio, Nina and Edward found themselves increasingly connected to what he was creating. “We felt a deep emotional connection to his work and his intuitive mark-making,” Edward says. “It was a natural progression to exhibit his work in the gallery from then on.”
Look closely, he says, and there is far more happening within Shal’s paintings than might first appear: layers and interwoven textures building upon one another to form the work beneath the surface.
It is a relationship that says a lot about China Heights itself. Artists have come into Nina and Edward’s orbit, conversations have developed, work has been made and connections have endured.
On the walls
More than two decades after they first opened the doors above Foster Street, the art still speaks for itself. Discover more about China Heights exhibitions and its artists at chinaheights.com.au.
