The gallery's acting director John Monteleone has been appointed as program director under a revised organisational structure that took effect at the beginning of March.

Some staff have been moved to different roles, with new positions for a technical officer and a co-ordinator of education programs.

The council officially took over the gallery in July last year and initiated a lengthy chain of restructuring and financial processes.

The final step will be to wind up the public company, Wollongong City Gallery Ltd, and move its assets across to council ownership. The council's community, cultural and library services manager, Jenny Thompson, is optimistic that process will be finalised by the end of the year.

Attention has turned to increasing public input into the gallery's future.

A call has gone out for people who want to be part of a 12-member Wollongong City Gallery Reference Group.

Representatives could include artists, art-lovers, businesspeople and educational organisations.

"They will be advising the gallery on a range of different things that the gallery does," Mr Monteleone said.

"They will be representatives of the community and will bring expertise and networks. We are really interested in getting a range of people with different ideas."

He said representatives from the University of Wollongong, Illawarra Institute of TAFE and the Education Department would be invited to join the group to reflect the strong links between the gallery and the education sector.

"One of the key issues is how we manage the art collection, which is a community asset," he said.

"We want them to assist in developing an acquisitions fund and source available funding, so we can purchase new items for the collection.

"We already have some work that is of national historical significance, including four works by Eugene von Guerard, who is arguably one of Australia's most prominent colonial artists. We need to build on that."

Expressions of interest for the reference group will close on March 26.

Ms Thompson said a series of public forums also was planned, with dates to be confirmed in the next month, seeking community engagement, to gather people's views and feedback "so we can plan for the future".