"This is a con," he said.

But after checks with AusAid and Griffith University, the offer turned out to be genuine.

The Glen Innes gallery, which is just two years old, was invited to "the most prestigious art exhibition in the world," said co-owner Wendy Hornsby.

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Lloyd has also been accepted to exhibit during the Cannes Film Festival in May 2020, the Bienneal Basel in June 2020, Carrousel du Louvre in October 2020 and during the PAKS galleries through 2021.

Lloyd says it's an opportunity to put Glen Innes on the map.

"It's going to show off this gallery. It'll be put to them that we're (in) Glen Innes,

"It's could draw international visitors."

Cannes is probably the world's most famous film festival. Held in the south of France since 1946, some 30,000 people are accredited to attend the festival, almost all from the film industry.

Wendy Hornsby said the estimate is that more than 98,000 people will see the exhibition.

"How good is that for an artist in Glen Innes!" she said.

It won't be completely a first for the gallery; they've already sold art in the UK, France and Canada. But it's clearly a big vote of approval in a gallery just two years old.

The gallery was recently announced as a finalist in the state Tourism Awards, and won a silver medal in the Outback tourism awards in July.

Lloyd said he hopes the recognition will help expand the public idea of what Indigenous art can be, which is in his view too stereotyped.

"I'm not an egotistical man, but I go down to the National Gallery and you see Northern Territory Art," he said.

"They go and they purchase all this stuff from the Centre."

It's part of a broader racial stereotype that 'real' Aboriginal people live on a mission in the Northern Territory; in fact most Indigenous Australians live in cities, with many more living in regional centres across the country.

The stereotype that Aboriginal art is a dot-painting of a snake not longer reflects that reality - and Lloyd thinks it's time for Federal and State governments to recognise that diversity.