Artists and makers from across the Geelong Region have opened their doors and put on a display for the public for this year's Design Week.

The 2022 theme is Taur, which means belonging in the language of the Wadawurrung people, Traditional Owners of Djilang (Geelong).

More than 115 artists at 37 venues are opening their doors to the public, allowing a behind the scenes peek into these artistic and creative workspaces, getting up close and personal to watch the artists at work, and ask questions whilst the artists create their magic.

Proud Wadawurrung woman and emerging Elder from Ballarat Deanne Gilson is one of the artists who is sharing her work.

Gilson said Taur to her signified being settled and at peace on country, and sharing this with family and friends.

"It is also about being accountable for one's actions on country to care and protect it," she said.

"This resonates with our creation story of Bundjil, the eagle, making a lore of the land to care and protect it and also care for our children for they are the future."

Highlighting the theme, Gilson has created a piece of artwork - Yalik Beek Murrup (water, country, spirit) which will be the signature design for all the event collateral and signage.

Gilson said her artwork explored traditional women's business pre-colonisation such as ceremonies and ancestors survived.

"(It looks at) their spiritual beliefs alongside reclaiming and reviving traditional marks found on ancestral artefacts," she said.

"In my painting Yaluk Beek Murrup I have depicted water painted in white ceremonial ochre that we use to paint our bodies up in.

"My own body is made up of water and this links to my country and the water flowing through my body, showing a deep link with country, we are country."

"That is where you hear the term the earth is our mother, it has a strong significance to me to care for country as if my mother.

Gilson said the white was an extension of ancestral spirit and knowledge, and the black basalt stone represented the under-country and its knowledge coming forward to the surface.

"The stones are also women's business and tell the story of our women," she said.

"I am only the person passing this onto my children, a link in a chain of over 65,000 years knowledge."

Geelong Design Week is being held from March 17 to 27.