Mazda tests the market waters in Canberra with world premiere of four new SUVs

Of all the things you expect to see parked up outside the National Gallery of Australia (NGA), four Mazda SUVs aren’t high up on the list.

But the Japanese car brand chose to host an “exclusive preview of its leading new CX SUV models” in Canberra on Wednesday night, “marking the very first time that all four models have premiered on the world stage”.

You have to admit – it’s nice to be called the “world stage”.

The CX-60, CX-70, CX-80 and CX-90 were all arranged out the front of the main entrance of the NGA, glittering under spotlights.

The CX-60 is already on sale here – as something a bit more rear-wheel-drive biased and with more cylinders than the CX-5 – and the seven-seat CX-90 is here too, as successor to the CX-9.

But when the CX-70 and CX-80 go on sale later this year, Australia will become the only market in the world to offer all four at once. Other countries are, in effect, told to ”pick two”. And it’s easy to see why, because there sure isn’t much between them.

But PR executives aren’t concerned they’ll tread on each other’s toes.

“Our mantra at Mazda Australia has always been to offer customers the widest choice of vehicles we possibly can,” Mazda Australia senior PR manager Alex Fisk told Region.

“We’re very fortunate to be able to furnish our customers with a vehicle for every stage of their life and to match their individual requirements across a diverse portfolio of body styles and price points.”

Mazda has been heading upmarket, slowly but surely, ever since the 2012 6 sedan and wagon, with its Bose sound system and leather seats in all but the base model.

The new CX models, however, really mean business.

For instance, the CX-60 starts at $60,400 before on-roads for the base Evolve six-cylinder mild-hybrid, and extends to $86,100 for the Azami plug-in hybrid version. And the larger CX-90 starts at $73,800 for the base Touring and rises to $93,655 for the Azami petrol.

The journalists who attended the preview event didn’t get to try out the CX-70 or CX-80, largely because the former was imported here for the occasion from the US and the steering wheel was mounted on the wrong side.

But they appear just as beautifully decked out – and spacious – as the 60 and 90 models.

Mr Fisk said specs and pricing for the CX-70 and CX-80 would be confirmed at the end of this year when they both launched locally.

As for why they were arrayed outside a Canberra art gallery over Wednesday night and Thursday? They had their reasons.

NGA director Dr Nick Mitzevich recounted how Mazda is one of the few car brands to still make clay models of its cars in the design stage.

“I love how the way Mazda works is similar to how many sculptors work, where they add and subtract from a medium to get the aesthetics, the form, the dynamics all looking good,” he said.

He also told a story about how his mother was the proud owner of a burgundy Mazda3, even if she never cracked the 100 km/h mark.

“I drove her once and she said to me that there was one thing she really liked about the Mazda, and that was that her teeth marks in the seat belt when I was doing 110 km/h didn’t stay in the belt.”

But there is also a deeper connection.

Mazda Australia has sponsored not-for-profit organisation Art Exhibitions Australia (AEA) for three decades, starting with a touring Renoir exhibition.

“At the time, Mazda was looking to differentiate its position in the community and sought an opportunity to enhance the brand by being associated with a prestigious cultural thing,” a spokesperson said during the evening.

When the exhibition arrived in Sydney, Mazda had managed to cram as many of its Eunos 500 cars into the car park as possible and it’s said guests spent just as much time perusing the cars as they did the art of one of the world’s most famous Impressionist painters.

Here and now, AEA helped the NGA pull together more than 140 works from up to 68 public and private collections worldwide for Gauguin’s World: TONA IHO, TONA AO.

This exhibition opens at the NGA from 10 am to 5 pm every day from Saturday (29 July) to Monday, 17 October. Tickets are much cheaper than a new Mazda CX.

Book online.