Institute of Modern Art: Recent Episodes
Institute of Modern Art
Founded in 1975, the IMA is the longest-running contemporary art space of its kind in Australia. As one of the country’s first non-collecting public galleries, the IMA has played an integral role in developing contemporary art in Queensland, Australia, and internationally.
This panel discussion was recorded following a screening of the Khaled Hourani's film Picasso in Palestine (2012). Hear Miriam Deprez (photojournalist and PhD candidate, Griffith University), Dr Jamal Nabulsi (diaspora Palestinian writer and researcher), and Remah Naji (Member, Justice for Palestine, Magan-djin) in conversation, facilitated by Dr Samid Suliman (Senior Lecturer, Migration and Security at Griffith University).This discussion contextualises the film against the decades-long history of the occupation of Palestine, reflects on the im/mobilities that it documents, and instigates an important discussion of the role and duty of the arts to act (transnationally and transversally) against dispossession, occupation, state violence, and genocide.
Curated and hosted by author Ellen van Neerven (Mununjali), Poetic Intentions welcomed several First Nations poets and writers to share their work on the expansive stage in Daniel Boyd's exhibition Rainbow Serpent (Version).Listen back to an evening of spoken works from Darby Jones, Cheryl Leavy, Aurora Liddle-Christie, Yasmin Smith, Vika Mana, and Joella Warkill.
Listen to author Melanie Saward (Bigambul, Wakka Wakka) present a new story written in response to Daniel Boyd's exhibition Rainbow Serpent (Version).Saward's debut novel, Burn, was published to critical acclaim in 2023, and her second novel, Love Unleashed, will be published by Penguin Random House in 2024. Her writing has been published in Griffith Review, Meanjin, and Flock: First Nations Stories Then and Now alongside leading Aboriginal writers, and shortlisted for numerous awards.
Audio description of Justine Youssef's multi-sensory installation 'Somewhat Eternal' (2023).
Publishing for over a decade, VAULT is Australia’s leading glossy art quarterly. The magazine profiles the work of prominent artists from Australasia and beyond, with forays into areas such as fashion, architecture, and literature.Hear VAULT Editor-in-Chief Alison Kubler in conversation with IMA Director Robert Leonard on the occasion of the launch of VAULT no. 44: The Future Issue.Looking to artists at the vanguard for a sense of the future of art and society, this issue profiles the work of Serwah Attafuah, Michael Candy, Boris Eldagsen, Jenny Holzer, Patricia Piccinini, Agnieszka Pilat, Jordan Wolfson, and more.
Audio descriptions of selected works in Daniel Boyd's painting 'Untitled (NAIFAG)' (2023).
In Australia and across the globe demands are growing for a society in which prisons and policing are no longer the default solution to address social, economic, and political issues in our communities. Despite this, systems of surveillance, classification, and control extend far beyond prison walls, parole boards, and courtrooms. They are embedded in archives, bureaucratic procedures, and the subsequent documents that record an individual’s lived experience. Unveiling the ineptitude of ‘official records’, You’ll Know It When You Feel It is a socially engaged art project that seeks to resist bureaucratic representations of women whose lives intersect with the prison-industrial complex.
Co-created by Brisbane based artist Raphaela Rosella, this intimate work has emerged over fifteen years alongside several women in her life. From six-minute phone calls to handwritten letters that circulate between Rosella, her friends, family members, and loved ones, the multi-authored exhibition You’ll Know It When You Feel It examines the value of their co-created archive as a site of resistance.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe a walk through of the three gallery spaces, stopping to describe key works in each room. This is followed by a short excerpt of text from the exhibition broadsheet, written by Raphaela Rosella, to aid interpretation.
Casino Wake Up Time member, Kylie Caldwell, shares three poems which she has written about native plants and the diverse waterways which sustain them on Bundjalung country in the Northern Rivers.Nanna You Remember! is a poem about wetlands, and the animals and plants within these wetlands. It’s a place where the weaving fibre, buckie rush, is collected. Kylie shares that wetlands are one of the most valuable ecosystems which act as reservoirs to collect water during big rains, reducing the effects of flooding. They protect coastal areas from storm surges by securing fragile soil and sand, and purify water by acting as a filter. Kylie dedicates this poem to her ancestors, who held a wealth of knowledge about these ecosystems.Picking Again is a poem about Casino Wake Up Time collecting rushes and other plants for weaving.A Survivor is a poem about lomandra, a plant that plays a significant role in supporting the banks of rivers and creeks and keeping these waters healthy and strong.
In this mediation, Hanna invites you to be transported to the mouth of the River Ythan in Aberdeenshire Scotland. A large colony of grey and common seals call out from the estuary banks. The sound of their calls are carried in the wind. Hanna shares two traditional seal-calling songs, and teaches an extract from one of these which she works with in her seal calling improvisations. This traditional Scottish Gaelic seal-calling song comes from the collection of Marjory Kennedy Fraser, an early twentieth century folklorist. It is a simple song created entirely from wordless sounds that imitate the grey seal's singing.
In this audio mediation, Marjetica talks about the referendum for water rights in Slovenia in 2021 and her collaboration with Uncle Ray Woods to make 2 visual essays titled The Rights of a River and The Life of the Lachlan River. The drawings tell of the struggles of two rivers in different parts of the world: the Soča River in Slovenia and the Lachlan River in Australia, in New South Wales. She invites the listener to consider rivers as a subject with whom we can foster a relationship with, rather than an object.
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik (Legends from the deep sitting peacefully on the waters) Selected works from the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rivus
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik (Legends from the deep sitting peacefully on the waters) Selected works from the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rivus
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik (Legends from the deep sitting peacefully on the waters) Selected works from the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rivus
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik (Legends from the deep sitting peacefully on the waters) Selected works from the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rivus
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik (Legends from the deep sitting peacefully on the waters) Selected works from the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rivus
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik (Legends from the deep sitting peacefully on the waters) Selected works from the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rivus
Since 2020, Gordon Hookey has made placards and banners which explore the visual histories of protest and his interpretation of contemporary politics. Join Hookey for an artist talk focusing on this area of his practice, specifically the new commission of eight banners presented in A MURRIALITY.
In this talk facilitated by Cheryl Leavy, Hookey speaks to his process of making this body of work, drawing on his archive of posters that span forty-years and document issues from land rights to refugee advocacy, and Indigenous excellence in sports, music, and art. The commissioned works continue his witty critique of racism; exploring oral- and image-based history-making traditions, to create a biting satire of Australian culture and politics.
A MURRIALITY is Gordon Hookey’s first survey show, charting three decades of practice where artmaking and activism fuse.
Please note: This exhibition contains adult content including strong language and graphic imagery.
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY
Audio Descriptions and Interpretive Texts for select works in Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY
Join us for this accessible and generative conversation about contemporary art and psychoanalysis, grounded in the development of Natalya Hughes exhibition The Interior. Natalya Hughes is joined by clinical psychologist Dr Andrew Geeves and author and academic Professor Susan Best to talk about what psychoanalysis is and how it is useful in a contemporary context.
The Interior evokes an exaggerated consultation room, playfully furnished for psychoanalysis. The forms and decorative surfaces of the works in this installation reference the consultation room and practices of the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud. Given the abundance of imagery which The Interior draws from Freud’s work, we will ponder the question, how can art be informed by psychoanalysis and psychoanalysis informed by art?
Join Sydney-based independent curator and guest judge for ‘the churchie’ Sebastian Goldspink, for this talk which details the realisation of his most recent project, the 2022 Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art: Free/State for the Art Gallery of South Australia. Goldspink unpacks the journey of a biennial from ideation to realisation. The 2022 Adelaide Biennial featured 25 prominent Australian artists from every state and territory across multiple generations from emerging to established.
Listen to Aha Ensemble in conversation with Professor Bree Hadley as they discuss their newly commissioned participatory installation Absolutely Everybody Judges.
Audio description with integrated interpretive text of Absolutely Everybody Judges by Aha Ensemble
How can circular design interrupt and divert the systems of production and use that dominate how we consume? How much scope does ethical and sustainable design have for change in a society that still operates under capitalist systems? This discussion features hyperlocal designers and makers as they share their approaches to practicing circular design principles. Facilitated by curator Ineke Dane, panellists include architect Emma Healy, fashion designer Maria Nelson Molloy and Clare Kennedy, representing design studio Five Mile Radius, whose work features in An Alternative Economics.
A conversation with award-winning visionary artist and director Jenn Nkiru to gain insight into her vibrant video practice. Nkiru will be in dialogue with fellow artist Atong Atem, to discuss experimental documentary-making, Afrofuturism, reclaiming the archive, and cultural histories in her video art practice.
Audio Descriptions and interpretive texts for select artworks in An Alternative Economics
Audio Descriptions and interpretive texts for select artworks in An Alternative Economics
Audio Descriptions and interpretive texts for select artworks in An Alternative Economics
Audio Descriptions and interpretive texts for select artworks in An Alternative Economics
Audio Descriptions and interpretive texts for select artworks in An Alternative Economics
Audio Descriptions and interpretive texts for select artworks in An Alternative Economics
Audio Descriptions and interpretive texts for select artworks in An Alternative Economics
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
Audio descriptions and interpretive texts from select works in 'This language that is every stone'.
In this podcast, the co-curators of This language that is every stone speak with the editor of the exhibition’s forthcoming publication Olivia Fairweather about the development of the show, the postcolonial theories of Martinican philosopher Édouard Glissant, and what his work might mean in an Australian context. This podcast is a behind-the-scenes insight into the dynamic interaction of theory and art objects in curatorial practice—online from next Saturday 12 February.
Nina Sanadze received a special commendation for her work 'Apotheosis' in the churchie emerging art prize 2021. The exhibition was curated by Grace Herbert and judged by Rhana Devenport, Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia.
Audio Described by Jan Pyke Image by Joe Ruckli
Visaya Hoffie received a special commendation for her work 'Rich in Cryptocurrency' in the churchie emerging art prize 2021. The exhibition was curated by Grace Herbert and judged by Rhana Devenport, Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia.
Audio Described by Jan Pyke Image by Joe Ruckli
Kyra Mancktelow received a special commendation for her work 'No Perception' in the churchie emerging art prize 2021. The exhibition was curated by Grace Herbert and judged by Rhana Devenport, Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia.
Audio Described by Jan Pyke Image by Joe Ruckli
In this talk ‘the churchie’ 2021 judge Rhana Devenport traces pivotal moments in her collaborations, commissions and projects with artists, from performances in the first Asia Pacific Triennial and artist residencies in Aotearoa New Zealand, to her current work as a curatorial advisor for the Aichi Triennale 2022 in Japan.
How do First Nations artists approach representation in public spaces?
Taking artist Yhonnie Scarce‘s new commission 'Missile Park' as a starting point, Blaklash co-founder Troy Casey, with architect Kevin O’Brien, and artists Judy Watson, and Tony Albert, explore the intersection of architecture, memorial culture, and the representation of First Nations histories in their own projects and practices.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Recorded via video conference on the 27th of August, the artist is joined by IMA Executive Director Liz Nowell in conversation.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
Missile Park by Yhonnie Scarce is an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane which runs from 17 July to 18 September, 2021.
Yhonnie Scarce was born in Woomera, South Australia in 1973, and belongs to the Kokatha and Nukunu peoples. Scarce is a master glass-blower, which she puts to the service of spectacular and spectral installations ranging from the intimate to the architectural, each full of aesthetic, cultural and political significance. Her work also engages the photographic archive and found objects to explore the impact and legacies of colonial and family histories and memory.
Missile Park is a survey exhibition co-commissioned by the IMA with ACCA, Melbourne. It brings together work from the last 15 years of Scarce’s practice, alongside a major new commission from which the exhibition takes its name.
This audio tour developed by Jan Pyke will describe four key works from Missile Park, followed by didactic text written by exhibition co-curators Lisa Waup, Liz Nowell, and Max Delaney to aid interpretation.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this exhibition tour discusses images of deceased people.
In the lead up to the 2021 IMA Gala and Benefit Auction, art collector and CPA Brian Tucker held a public talk that looked at the art of art collecting. Having amassed an incredible collection of Indigenous and Australian artists, Tucker shared with audiences’ tips and tricks on how to start, where to start, and what to start with. In addition to tips and tricks, Tucker also shared how to develop an “eye” for art, how art collecting can support artists and the greater cultural sector, and even what tax incentives collectors can take full advantage of!
Photo: Damien O'Mara
On the 20th anniversary of the Afghan war, journalist, author and film-maker Antony Loewenstein analyses the impact of the longest, US-led conflict in history in this online lecture. What’s been the impact on Afghan civilians, refugees, and the broader global community and how does Australia’s military role in the war fit into Afghanistan’s current trajectory?
Loewenstein was joined by Khadim Ali, one of Australia’s most acclaimed artists, known for his masterful works that poetically explore the experience of displaced people across the globe. A member of the persecuted Hazara ethnic minority, Ali is the third generation of his family to be exiled from his homeland of Afghanistan. Expressing the profound horror, grief and loss experienced under modern-day warfare, his exhibition is necessary and vital during a time where political propaganda, violence, and fear pervades global relations.
Taking queer spaces, collaboration & communities in Brisbane as its point of departure, this panel discussion questioned how we might imagine a collective queer future.
Facilitated by 4ZZZ’s Dykes on Mykes, Ruth Gardner and Kate Mackie, panellists included exhibiting artist Tay Haggarty, visual artist, writer, and community event organiser Mo Chan, emerging artist and writer Shelley Cheng, and creative producer and DJ (Sweaty Baby) Thomas Parer.
(Photo by Joe Ruckli)
This panel discussion addressed the emergence of what fire historian Stephen Pyne calls the Pyrocene—the fire equivalent of an ice age—and how Queensland architecture and design face a critical moment of reflection.
Chaired by Susan Best, panellists include curator Tim Riley Walsh, publication contributor and academic Chani Larsson, and art historian Andrew McNamara.
On the opening day of Khadim Ali: 'Invisible Border' the artist was joined by IMA Executive Director Liz Nowell in conversation.
'Invisible Border' is Khadim Ali’s largest Australian solo exhibition to date, comprising sound installation, miniature painting, and intricately constructed textiles. Ali’s masterful works poetically explore the experience of displaced people across the globe.
'On Fire: Climate and Crisis' curator Tim Riley Walsh gives a detailed audio tour of the exhibition, on display at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane 30 January–20 March 2021.
Image: Tintin Wulia, 'Some Memory Prevails', 2019, courtesy of the artist and Milani Gallery, Brisbane. Photo: Louis Lim.
Listen to artist Caitlin Franzmann, gardener Kate Wall, and ecologist Renee Rossini in conversation about understanding and responsibly working with weeds.
The panellists share stories about getting to know plants that have been deemed unwanted and discuss the values that underpin such classifications. From a garden ‘soil improver’ to an environmental weed that has endangered a butterfly species, each plant interacts with the ecosystems they are nested within.
What are the ethical and cultural dilemmas we must consider when managing weeds? What are the plants telling us—about the soil, about the climate, about history? How do we listen?
Photo: Charlie Hillhouse
In an era defined by human impact on the environment and overlapping crises, is art’s poetic and critical capacity to influence change—what Elaine Scarry describes as their status as “fragments of world alteration”—being challenged or affirmed? How do artists see their work in this new era?
Join artists Kinly Grey, Warraba Weatherall, Tintin Wulia, and host and exhibition curator Tim Riley Walsh, in the second of three panel discussions engaging with key themes of the exhibition On Fire: Climate and Crisis.
Participant bios:
Kinly Grey is a Meanjin (Brisbane)-based artist who works with light, smoke, metaphysics, and feeling. Their site-specific installations reimagine ways to understand the world through sensory experience and poetics. Working in galleries and public spaces, Grey has held solo exhibitions at Metro Arts, Outer Space, and Boxcopy, in Brisbane, and The Walls, Gold Coast.
Warraba Weatherall is a Brisbane-based installation and street artist from the Kamilaroi Nation of south-west Queensland. Weatherall has a specific interest in archival repositories and structures, and the life of cultural objects and histories within these environments. His practice critiques the legacies of colonisation, where social, economic, and political realities perpetually validate Eurocentric ideologies.
Tintin Wulia is a Denpasar-born, Brisbane-based artist. Wulia works with video, installation, drawings, painting, sound, dance, text, performance and public interventions. Her interdisciplinary works – particularly on aspects of borders – are often participatory. Wulia has shown both nationally and internationally, including the Istanbul Biennale (2005), Moscow Biennale (2011), Sharjah Biennale (2013), and recently represented Indonesia at the 57th Venice Biennale (2017).
Tim Riley Walsh is the curator and editor of 'On Fire: Climate and Crisis'. Riley Walsh is an art historian, Australia Desk Editor for ArtAsiaPacific, Hong Kong, and a Post-Thesis Fellow within the School of Communication and Arts, University of Queensland, Brisbane.
Image: Kinly Grey, 'expanding bodies', 2019, installation view ‘Intimate Immensity’, Outer Space, Brisbane. Courtesy the artist. Photo: Charlie Hillhouse.
Join artists Dale Harding and Judy Watson, Firesticks Alliance representative Leeton Lee, and panel host Shannon Brett, in the first of a series of three panels expanding on key themes of the exhibition On Fire: Climate and Crisis.
This discussion looks at fire as a colonised entity within Queensland and Australia, the revival of cultural burning practices, their potential application to combat global warming fuelled ecological change, and how art can visualise these themes.
Bios
Dale Harding is a descendant of the Bidjara, Garingbal, and Ghungalu peoples of Central Queensland and a Brisbane-based artist. Harding works in a wide variety of media to explore the visual and social languages of his communities as cultural continuum, drawing upon and maintaining the spiritual and philosophical sensibilities of his cultural inheritance within the framework of contemporary art internationally.
Judy Watson was born in Mundubbera, Queensland, and lives and works in Brisbane, Queensland. Watson’s Aboriginal matrilineal family are from Waanyi country in north-west QLD. Her work reveals hidden stories within Country, working from site, archives and memory, uncovering Indigenous histories, following lines of emotional and physical topography that centre on particular places and moments in time.
Leeton Lee is a descendent of Bundjalung, Thungutti, and Mualgal peoples. Lee’s background is in youth work/community services and cultural education and is currently a Volunteer Firefighter with Tamborine Mountain Rural Fire Brigade where he is responsible for burn planning and assessment of all landscape burns. Previously, Lee was a practicing artist, working across various mediums, including wood carvings using self-made traditional tools to sustain cultural practice, and contributed commissioned works for the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games. Recently, Lee has been working with cultural fire through the Firesticks Alliance Networks and is heavily involved in Activations of fire Circles as Firesticks’ Southeast Queensland Coordinator.
Shannon Brett is a descendant of the Wakka Wakka, Butchulla and Gurang Gurang peoples of southern Queensland. Brett is an interdisciplinary artist who creates and designs artworks indicative of their experiences as an Aboriginal person living and surviving in modern, urban Australian society. Brett also works extensively as an independent curator, writer, trainer and arts manager, motivated by art that operates at the juncture of cultural politics and visual practice.
Join exhibition curator Freja Carmichael along with artist and publication designer Jenna Lee and award-winning, contributing poet Ellen van Neerven for a live panel discussion, celebrating the launch of exhibition publication long water: fibre stories.
long water: fibre stories illuminates spiritual, ancestral, and physical connections to water through fibre practices of artists from Yuwaalaraay (North West NSW), Quandamooka (Moreton Bay, South East QLD), Kuku Yalanji (Far North QLD), Zenadh Kes (Torres Strait Islands, QLD), Yurruwi (Milingimbi Island, NT), and surrounding homelands. Together this group—Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, spanning different generations and ancestries—share an inseparable relationship to water, be it the vast sea, inland waterways, or expansive river systems.
Collectively, long water celebrates the stories of regeneration and continuation of important cultural traditions, and the strong women and vital water places that sustain them. The country, and wide range of environments, practices, and knowledge represented speak to both deep time and contemporary experiences—bringing into focus the importance of water to our cultural health and our capacity for resilience.
This panel discussion takes off from the work of INFRACTIONS, specifically its use of the moving image to address the colonial infrastructure and cultural dimension of fossil gas expansions.
The conversation looks to discuss the relationship between ‘the situation’ of gas-fired futures, matters of cultural responsibility, survival, and refusal. Join Que Kenny, Phillip Marrii Winzer, Vernon Ah Kee, and INFRACTIONS director Rachel O’Reilly to discuss the work of doing things otherwise. Hosted by Warraba Weatherall.
Que Kenny (Western Arrarnta) is a community support worker, artist and activist from Ntaria (Hermannsburg), west of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory, also studying law at Deakin University, Melbourne. She has been involved in grassroots campaigns against the Northern Territory Emergency Response (‘The Intervention’) since 2007, and against Northern Territory gas fracking with the Protect Country Alliance. She has contributed to numerous fictional and environmental films and community projects, and accompanied INFRACTIONS to the Berlin and London launch. Her work has been profiled in Rolling Stone magazine and the Guardian.
Phillip Marrii Winzer is a Ngarabul and Wirrayaraay Murri, a member of Warriors of the Aboriginal Resistance, and former Organising Manager for Seed Indigenous Youth Climate Network. They are currently involved in activism around deaths in custody and refugee detention. In June they organized a crowd funder to buy back 20 acres of stolen land near the defunct Kingsgate Mines at Red Range, on Ngarabul country, rich in biodiversity and cultural heritage.
Vernon Ah Kee is a member of the Kuku Yalandji, Waanji, Yidinji, and Gugu Yimithirr peoples. His internationally renowned practice addresses ongoing colonial injustice and ancestral relations through conceptual text-based works and installations. His work, tall man (2010) used handheld camera footage of a community gathering on Palm Island following the release of the results of a coronial inquiry into Cameron Doomadgee’s death.
Rachel O’Reilly is an artist, writer, curator and PhD researcher at Goldsmiths’ Centre for Research Architecture. She is the director of INFRACTIONS now showing at the IMA, the final work of the ongoing project The Gas Imaginary (2013-2020). Recent curatorial collaborations include Ex-Embassy, Berlin; Planetary Records: Performing Justice between Art and Law, Contour Biennale; and Feminist Takes on Black Wave Film for Sternberg Press. She writes with Jelena Vesic on Non-Aligned Movement legacies and Danny Butt on artistic autonomy. She teaches How to Do Things with Theory at the Dutch Art Institute.
'INFRACTION'S features First Nations campaigners fighting threats to 51% of the Northern Territory from shale gas fracking, where 90% of the population relies on groundwater. Since the unconventional gas industry’s birth in Queensland, Australia is now the leading exporter of this fossil fuel globally, while since the filming of 'INFRACTIONS' the Federal Government has since doubled down on planet-warming gas projects as the solution to pandemic ‘recovery’. This panel updates on the current state of play for gas frontiers in the contemporary moment.
Guests: Neola Savage and Juliri Ingra and their 5 siblings are descendants of Dot and Hector Johnson who were active in the struggle for rights for Aboriginal and South Sea Islander peoples rights in Gladstone. The Johnsons were part of the first generation of Aboriginal teachers’ aids in Central Queensland, training in Melbourne at Deakin and Brisbane in mid-life. Juliri Ingra is an artist (die work and fibres) while Neola Savage continues Indigenous education and liaison work in Woorabinda.
Dan Robins has been an organizer against unconventional gas across Australia for more than a decade, currently working with the NT Protect Country Alliance. Before that Robins was the Sydney Coordinator with Lock The Gate Alliance working on the Our Land Our Water Our Future Campaign to stop invasive coal and gas projects across NSW. Robins has also assisted with anti fracking campaigns in QLD’s Scenic Rim area and in WA. In 2015 Robins presented at the International Anti Fracking Conference in Paris during the COP21 UN Climate Change Conference.
Join Georgia Morgan, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within her practice.
Georgia Morgan lives and works in lutruwita/Tasmania. Her practice explores the assumed hierarchies of materials and places through site-based research, performance/invented ritual, and sculptural installations. She uses photocopies, building materials, and detritus, assembled with ceramics, videos, and paintings that result in a blending of ‘high’ and ‘low’. Morgan graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Art in 2019 and was the recipient of the Bett Gallery Award.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Tom Blake, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within his practice.
Tom Blake’s solo and collaborative practice contemplates the psychological, architectural, and technological frameworks that surround us through fragmented moments, looped imagery, and recurring motifs. Drawing is the starting point for many of Blake’s works, over time becoming fragmented, transposed, and re-composed.
Blake has exhibited in Australia, Japan, and Italy, been a finalist in Fremantle Arts Centre (FAC) Print Award, the Fisher’s Ghost Art Award, the CLIP Award, The Blake Prize, and has been awarded a Clitheroe Foundation Emerging Sculptor Mentorship. Blake’s work has been exhibited at Artspace, AGWA, FAC, Perth Institute of Contemporary Art (PICA), Murray Art Museum Albury, c3 Contemporary Artspace, Firstdraft, and KNULP. Blake is also part of momo doto, an ongoing collaboration with Dominique Chen.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Why follow a border-crossing industry as it makes its way across Countries, and how do we refuse mining companies’ cultural work?
INFRACTIONS was made in the wake of the NT Scientific Inquiry into fracking and connects the Queensland and NT stories of approvals. Drilling and legal activism has commenced in the Beetaloo Basin following a brief period of rest and healing during the early days of the pandemic lockdown, while the Federal Government has since doubled down on planet-warming gas projects as a poor solution to pandemic economics. This panel will go beyond the making of the film and its return to the Central Desert in ways that continue storytelling around self-determination, water and climate matters.
INFRACTIONS is a travelling exhibition organised by the Institute of Modern Art. This project is supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.
This panel discussion was held at Watch This Space, Alice Springs/Mparntwe, on the 7th of November 2020.
Join Martin George, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within his practice.
Martin George is a Sydney-born, Melbourne-based artist who works with painting and drawing. He creates visual conversations between different types of mark-making—impulsive or considered—that depict imaginary environments.
George has recently exhibited at Haydens (2019) and Conners Conners (2020) and has been shortlisted for prizes including the Bayside Acquisitive Art Prize (2020, 2019), Redland Art Awards (2018), and the Arthur Guy Memorial Painting Prize (2017). He undertook a studio residency at Otis College of Art & Design, USA (2017) and he received a BFA (Hons.) from RMIT University (2016).
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Athena Thebus, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within her practice.
Athena Thebus uses sculpture, drawing, and writing to explore notions of desire. She has presented solo and collaborative work at Next Wave Festival, Performance Space’s Liveworks Festival, Campbelltown Arts Centre, ACE Open, Perth Institute of Contemporary Art, and Verge Gallery, among others. She guest edited the Runway Journal’s 39th issue (2019) and is a co-director at Firstdraft, Sydney.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Guy Louden, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within him practice.
Guy Louden is an Australian artist and curator living in Fremantle/Walyalup and born in Toronto. Louden’s practice explores notions of capitalism, technology, and what the distant future may look like in the face of a societal breakdown. He has run and founded experimental galleries and curated major exhibitions. From 2014 to 2016 Louden was a director of Moana Project Space and in 2015 he co-founded and managed Success, a large-scale art space in Fremantle. Louden’s artwork has been exhibited in Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Brisbane, and online.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Jess Bradford, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within her practice.
Jess Bradford is a Singaporean-born and Sydney-based artist working across painting, ceramics, video, and installation. Her work explores her mixed-race heritage by examining representations of cultural and national identity. Bradford has exhibited at various institutions and art spaces including Art Gallery of South Australia, 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art (2019), Bathurst Regional Art Gallery (2015), Fairfield Museum & Gallery (2014), and Penrith Regional Gallery & The Lewers Bequest (2013). She has been a finalist in the Ramsay Art Prize, John Fries Memorial Prize, the Tim Olsen Drawing Prize, and the Jenny Birt Award. Bradford is represented by Galerie pompom, Sydney.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Emily Parsons-Lord, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within her practice.
Emily Parsons-Lord’s practice is concerned with air and explosions. Recent work has recreated the air from past eras in Earth’s evolution, recreated starlight in coloured smoke, and experimented with pheromones, aerogel, and explosions. She has exhibited both nationally and internationally and participated in Primavera (2016), the NSW Visual Arts Fellowship (2017), Liveworks (2017), Bristol Biennial: In Other Worlds, (2016), John Fries Award (2018), A BROKEN LINK, Central St Martin’s, London (2017), Stuttgart Film Winter Festival for Expanded Media, Firstdraft, and Vitalstatistix, amongst others.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Lachlan McKee, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within his practice.
Lachlan McKee’s practice boils down the logic of pleasure, desire, and cultural production through painting, collage, and animation. Born in 1998, McKee lives and works in Melbourne. He holds a Bachelor of Fine Art (Painting) with Distinction from the Queensland College of Fine Art and is currently studying a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) at the Victorian College of the Arts.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Nabilah Nordin, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within her practice.
Nabilah Nordin is a Singaporean-Australian sculptor. Interested in material invention, her installations embrace a wonky craftsmanship, playfully celebrating the monstrous, visceral, and anthropomorphic qualities of materials.
Nordin’s work has been exhibited locally and internationally at galleries, museums, festivals, fairs, and biennales including; Institute of Contemporary Arts, Singapore Biennale, Neon Parc, The Commercial, COMA, LON Gallery, Artbank, Firstdraft, DISINI Festival, Bundoora Homestead Art Centre, and Margaret Lawrence Gallery.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join James Nguyen, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within his practice.
James Nguyen uses documentary and performance, working with family and friends, to make work about the politics of art, self-representation, and collective risk. Nguyen was the recipient of the Clitheroe Foundation Scholarship and the Anne & Gordon Samstag International Visual Arts Scholarship
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Talia Smith, curator of the 2020 churchie emerging art prize, for an educator focussed curator talk, discussing the curatorial strategies applied to creating the churchie 2020 emerging art prize exhibition. Listen to curatorial insights that can be applied to working with students, assisting in the development of their practices and contextualising their practices within thematic exhibitions.
Join Yasbelle Kerkow, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within her practice.
Yasbelle Kerkow is an Australian-born, Fijian (vasu Batiki, Lomaiviti) artist. Her work focuses on promoting Pacific communities and their stories in Australia. She is a community arts facilitator and leader of the Kulin Nations (Melbourne) based art collective New Wayfinders.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
Join Nathan Beard, finalist in the churchie emerging art prize 2020, in conversation with exhibition curator Talia Smith, exploring the themes and ideas embedded within his practice.
Nathan Beard is a Perth-based interdisciplinary artist whose work addresses the complex interplay of culture and memory in the shaping of identity. Beard’s practice situates sincere and intimate exchanges with his Thai family alongside broader cultural signifiers to generate slippages of identity and query ‘Thainess’. Within this collision of aesthetic and emotional influences Beard’s practice personalises broader perspectives around diasporic identity.
Beard holds a Bachelor of Arts (Arts) with First Class Honours from Curtin University. He has recently exhibited at Firstdraft (2020), Cool Change Contemporary (2019), Bus Projects (2019), Turner Galleries (2018), and Art Gallery of Western Australia (2017). In 2017 Beard was selected for the 4A Beijing Studio Program, shortlisted as a finalist for the John Stringer Prize, and awarded Highly Commended in the Fremantle Art Centre Print Award.
https://ima.org.au/exhibitions/the-churchie-emerging-art-prize-2020/
In the fourth episode of Interno, Mariam Arcilla speaks with Bianca Mavrick, a Brisbane-based jewellery designer of Greek heritage. Conducted over Zoom, they discuss the cultural signifiers, familial narratives and colour palettes that inform Bianca’s practice, as well as the rituals and DIY activities that help Bianca revitalise during times of disquietude.
In the third episode of Interno, Mariam Arcilla speaks with Sara Morawetz, a New Mexico-based Australian artist, investigator and method maker. Sara explores the emotional and psychogeographical forces behind scientific action and systems to create durational performances and exploratory research.
Conducted over Zoom, Sara reflects on her first-hand experience of coronavirus, her collaborations with NASA scientists, and why university arts degrees are crucial for Australia’s creative currency. This episode also explores how the artist uses her body as an apparatus and an archive to create works that unveil the processes of methodological labour.
https://makingart.work/projects/interno/sara-morawetz
In the second episode of 'Interno', Mariam Arcilla speaks with Sezzo, a proud Ngāpuhi woman whose practice investigates what it’s like to be a modern Māori within club music and sociology. Conducted over Zoom, they explore BIPOC narratives in art, music and science, seeking solace during a pandemic, and how cultural knowledge can be manifested through the dancing body. Sezzo also discusses her early days in the Brisbane dance scene, and why she turned her back on the DJ world to pursue a new life in South Korea.
makingart.work/projects/interno/
Māori #BIPOC #Activism
In the first episode of 'Interno', Mariam Arcilla speaks with Gabriella Mozo, Mal Tayag, and Marielle Sales from Sari-Sari Studio, a New York based collective that supports Filipinx and BIPOC creatives and innovators. Conducted over Zoom, this group discussion explores creativity and connection during lockdown, shared cultural identities, and social justice activism.
Produced and hosted by Mariam Arcilla, 'Interno' is a time capsule that profiles artists who are recalibrating their internal lives and perspectives of home, longing, and connection during the global pandemic. With conversations taking place between Australia, North America and Asia, 'Interno' presents a plurality of experiences that amplify artistic value and social duty in times of flux.
https://makingart.work/projects/interno/
In conjunction with the exhibition 'Topographic Resolutions II' at local artist-run initiative Kuiper Projects, the IMA and Kuiper presented a panel discussion and screening that considered the relationship between landscape and computer-generated imagery, both in contemporary art and wider culture.
Curator Kyle Weise and artists Baden Pailthorpe and Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox discuss their relationships to digital depictions of landscape and its entanglement with militarism, a theme also found across the late filmmaker Harun Farocki’s practice.
The discussion was followed by a screening of one of Farocki’s final films, Parallel I-IV (2012-14, 45 mins) which incorporates found footage including that from video games The Legend of Zelda and Grand Theft Auto V to comment on the genre of computer animation and the history of style in computer graphics.
Image: Harun Farocki, 'Parallel III' (video still), 2014, HD Video, 00:07:21. Image copyright of the artist, courtesy of Video Data Bank, School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
For over 25 years, artist Tania Bruguera has created socially-engaged performances and installations that examine the nature and effect of political power structures.
In this artist talk Bruguera discusses her research, as well as some of her many short-term and long-term projects.
Tania Bruguera visited Australia as a guest of MUMA | Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne.
IMA Belltower artist Sancintya Mohini Simpson is joined in conversation with historian and curator Imelda Miller, bringing to fore the colonial practice of forced and indentured labour and tracing its impacts to the present day.
Simpson and Miller use their own archival research practices and exhibition-making as a tool to bring their ancestral stories to light and act as a sites of acknowledgement, commemoration, and healing.
The discussion explores the often-absented stories of ‘blackbirding’ South Sea Islander communities—a practice of kidnapping and forced labour on sugar cane farms in Australia—and the parallel history of Indian indentured labour forced to work in South African sugar cane farms. Simpson and Miller draw these stories into the complicated narrative of colonialism and contemporary society.
UK-based artist Marianna Simnett in conversation with Institute of Modern Art Director, Liz Nowell, discussing Simnett's current exhibition 'CREATURE'. Hear insights from Simnett on her practice and the development of the exhibition, from how the title 'CREATURE' came to be and how the artist uses her body as a tool in the making of her works.
Founding member of Raqs Media Collective, Shuddhabrata Sengupta, in conversation with independent curator and writer Tess Maunder. Sengupta and Maunder discuss how the collective operates as artist-curators, the group’s approach to managing biennales and artist-run spaces, and their role as critical voices in the global south.
Artist Sebastian Moody discusses his practice and newly-commissioned temporary public artwork, 'Seeing'.
Moody’s work is the inaugural IMA Belltower Façade Projection, visible after dark on the façade of the Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts. Somewhere between a list and poem, 'Seeing' is comprised entirely of six letter words intended to create moments of contemplation on Brunswick Street, Fortitude Valley.
Moody is also joined by his collaborator, designer Sai Karlen, to discuss the process of working together to animate and bring to life this kinetic typography projection.
Minneapolis-based curators Sara Cluggish (Director of FD13 residency for the arts)and Pavel Pyś (Curator of Visual Arts, the Walker Art Center) presented a curatorial masterclass informed by experience working with performance and interdisciplinary contemporary artistic practices.
Drawing on the breadth of their professional experiences—from the context of the small-scale public institution and independent residency program; to scholarly research institute and large-scale interdisciplinary art centres—Cluggish and Pyś discussed projects that have informed their respective approaches to curating.
Artist Mandy Quadrio and IMA Belltower curator Freja Carmichael in conversation, exploring Quadrio’s use of culturally significant materials and her personal connection to sea Country.
Quadrio’s exhibition 'The Country Within' was the inaugural exhibition of the IMA Belltower, a year-long program dedicated to Queensland art exploring the meaning of place. In this solo exhibition palawa woman Quadrio presented a series of large-scale sculptures using a natural material rich with spiritual and cultural meaning: Tasmanian bull kelp.
Dale Harding in conversation with IMA Directors Aileen Burns and Johan Lundh, discussing Harding’s survey exhibition, 'Current Iterations'.
Current Iterations brings together new and recent works, focusing on shared languages permeating landscape, bodies, and objects. This conversation will address the works on display at the IMA, as well as wider concerns in Harding’s practice.
In conjunction with an exhibition of work by Cuban American artist Ana Mendieta at the IMA, guest curator Professor Susan Best presents a talk titled 'Ana Mendieta’s emotional ties'. Best’s talk will centre on the 'Silueta' series—considered Mendieta’s most important work—and consider the artist’s ideas about an emotional connection to the earth.
Taking place within Dale Harding’s (Bidjara, Garingbal, and Ghungalu peoples) exhibition 'Current Iterations' this special First Thursdays event brings together the community embedded within Harding’s practice and the exhibition itself.
Harding joins an esteemed line-up of family, Countrymen, allies, and experts from a variety of backgrounds to discuss one of the key touchstones in this exhibition: Carnarvon Gorge. This is an opportunity to learn about one of the world’s most significant rock art landscapes, its centrality to Harding’s practice, its cultural importance for First Nations people, and some of the urgent challenges this, and many other rock art sites, are presently facing.
After having exhibited extensively nationally and internationally, Current Iterations is Dale Harding’s largest exhibition to date. This show brings together new and recent works focusing on objects dislocated by museum practices, as well as living culture activated in and outside the confines of art. The show carefully addresses the relocation of objects, the creation of architecture and landscape in sculptural form, and the learning and activation of culture through carving and stencilling with mouth-blown ochre by Harding and other members of his community. Harding’s practice of cultural continuity is both urgent and constantly evolving; it creates opportunities for shared expression.
Please note: Unfortunately the first few minutes of Harding's conversation with his father was not picked up in this recording.
To celebrate the Brisbane launch of the new book 'An Act of Showing: rethinking artist-run initiatives through place', publication co-editors Maria Miranda and Anabelle Lacroix, were joined in conversation with members of artist-run initiatives (ARIs) in South East Queensland.
For this special launch event the editors were joined by Aishla Manning (The Laundry Artspace), Rebecca Ross (The Walls), Danni Zuvela (Liquid Architecture, Other Film, The Walls), and Simone Hine and Kyle Weise (Kuiper Projects, ScreenSpace, Beam Contemporary, Metro Arts), to discuss the relevance of place for ARIs as well as responsiveness, cross-pollination, institutionalisation, and legacies.
Artist Dale Harding (Bidjara, Garingbal and Ghungalu peoples) is joined in conversation with Steve Kemp (Ghungalu peoples), a traditional medicine specialist from Woorabinda in Central Queensland.
Kemp continues the legacy that his father Tim Kemp created as a noted Ghungalu plants specialist, with his expertise in their traditional uses and in medicine. Harding and Kemp discuss the interconnectedness of trees and other plants in Central and South-East Queensland; and how the legacy of such knowledges resist current forces of cultural and spiritual dispossession.
For the launch of VAULT Issue 25 at the IMA editor Alison Kubler is joined in conversation with guests Professor Susan Best, curator of the exhibition 'Ana Mendieta: Connecting to the Earth', on display at the IMA, and Naomi Evans, Curator, Griffith University Art Museum.
German curator and writer Axel Wieder visits Brisbane for the first time, speaking at the IMA.
Wieder is currently the director of Bergen Kunsthall in Norway and was previously the director of Index— the Swedish Contemporary Art Foundation in Stockholm (2014-2018), and head of program at Arnolfini Centre of Contemporary Arts in Bristol (2012-2014). In this talk he discusses his time working on past projects, speaking specifically about the city as field of resonance, exhibitions as activities, and his experiences at both smaller and larger institutions.
On the occasion of first retrospective of leading contemporary Chinese artist Xiao Lu, 'Impossible Dialogue' (4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney), Xiao Lu is joined by exhibition curators Claire Roberts and Xu Hong, discussing some of the artist’s recent performance works.
'Ocean Between Us' was an evening of meditative breath work led by artist Naomi Blacklock and her mother Charlie Blacklock 7 June, 2018. Take part in participatory meditation and ritualised body practice, blending the yoga practice of Charlie with Naomi’s sound practice.
Nicholson and Harding discuss making work on the surfaces of architecture, air and particles as a way to make marks, and absences and politics in stencilling processes.
British art historian, curator, writer and teacher, David Elliott, at the IMA as part of the 21st Biennale of Sydney’s Biennale Archive Stories. Elliott will share his experiences as a prolific director of museums and biennales, including the 17th Biennale of Sydney.
Can intellectual property law protect the distinct output of today’s curator? As the role of the curator evolves, copyright and moral rights in the exhibition-making process must be considered. In this lecture on curatorial authorship, freelance curator and lawyer Alana Kushnir explores the legal rights of curators
Learn more about Brisbane-based artist Ryan Presley’s ongoing project 'Blood Money' (2010–present), which deals with representation and exchange. In his exhibition at the IMA, 'Prosperity', Presley reimagines our figureheads on Australian banknotes as the heroes and warriors of Aboriginal history, including Pemulwuy, Dundalli, and Oodgeroo Noonuccal. Hear from Presley, in conversation with exhibition curator Madeleine King.
'Seeing in Blak and White; On a Scale of One to 1788 How Authentic Are You?' What influence does the collection of historical cultural material in both art and natural history museums have on contemporary Aboriginal art today? How are artists challenging the palette of what is 'acceptable' Aboriginal art? In this third In Colour talk at the IMA.
The series opens with a debate that will help us find an answer to the question: is contemporary art chromophobic? Two experts on aesthetics, Professors Susan Best and Andrew McNamara, will go head-to-head on whether colour still matters in contemporary art. And for a quick warm up to the evening’s official proceedings, join In Colour curator, Madeleine King, for a look at colour’s decline in contemporary art, in pictures.
Artists are always falling prey to something or other. Censorship, curators, bad lighting, jet lag, bigotry, cultural prejudice, institutions in particular, and The Institution At Large.
This talk traces the role and political rationale of self-marginalisation within the moral economy of contemporary art.
08/11/2016
In the fifth lecture in our 'The Artist As…' series, co-presented with Curatorial Practice at Monash Art Design and Architecture, Brook Andrew reflects on his collaborations and interventions in museums both in Australia and internationally. Andrew examines the important role his own extensive archive plays within these works, and what led him to collect in the first place.
13/09/2016
In the fourth lecture in our year-long series 'The Artist As…' co-presented with Curatorial Practice at Monash Art Design and Architecture, Associate Professor Tara McDowell will focus on the ‘artist as initiator’.
24/08/2016
Writer/artist, poet and researcher Rachel O’Reilly’s discusses her ongoing collaborative project in 'Frontier Imaginaries: No Longer at Ease', 'The Gas Imaginary' (2011-).
26/05/2016
Hookey and Aird discuss Hookey's commission for the exhibition 'Frontier Imaginaries'. The work is part of an ongoing series of 10-metre long canvasses that re-imagine the history of Queensland from an Indigenous perspective. Hookey has set up a studio in the gallery and is continuing to work on the ambitious painting during the exhibition.
02/06/2016
Guerrero (Colombia, 1983) is the Estrellita B. Brodsky Adjunct Curator of Latin American Art at Tate in London. From 2011-2014 he was the Associate Artistic Director and Curator at TEOR/éTica, an independent not-for-profit art space founded in 1999 in San José, Costa Rica.
30/03/2016
Curator Emily Pethick speaks about the artist as collaborator through examples from The Showroom, a non-profit independent contemporary art space in London, UK. She will discuss some of the artists’ projects produced that have involved diverse forms of participation, as well as in relation to how the organisation works with artists through co-production.
12/04/2016
Daniel Boyd speaks about his Green Room exhibition and artistic practice. Boyd is a descendant of the Kudjla/Gangalu peoples from Far North Queensland. Boyd’s acclaimed practice deftly layers colonial history, European modernism and its connections to the Pacific, and the subtle interplay between lenses and techniques of Western and Indigenous art of Australia.
24/03/2016
In this talk, Daniel Barber discusses the role of image making and distribution as a central arena for rethinking the relationship between architecture and climate in the 1940s and 1950s. Drawing on discussions from numerous fields, he emphasises the complicated role of academic institutions and non-governmental organisations in reframing the relationship of architecture to global ecological knowledge.
16/03/2016
'The Artist As…’ is a year-long lecture series co-presented with Curatorial Practice at MADA (Monash Art Design and Architecture), Melbourne, examining the multitude of roles artists occupy and adapt today.
This talk is presented in partnership with the 20th Biennale of Sydney, and was made possible with generous assistance from the Nelson Meers Foundation. Sydney-born, Berlin-based artist Adam Linder is a also choreographer and dancer. His continuing series Choreographic Services (2013-ongoing) have been commissioned, presented, and hired by HAU Hebbel-am-Ufer Berlin, Institute of Contemporary Art London, Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles, Museum of Modern Art Warsaw, American Realness NYC, Kampnagel Hamburg, and Frieze LIVE London, amongst other engagements.
10/03/2016
Rana Hamadeh is speaking about her practice and recent project, 'The Sleepwalkers', 25 February 2016.
'The Artist As…' is a year-long lecture series co-presented with Curatorial Practice at MADA (Monash Art Design and Architecture), Melbourne, examining the multitude of roles artists occupy and adapt today.
Céline Condorelli is an artist living and working in London and Milan; she is the author and editor of Support Structures, Sternberg Press (2009), and one of the founding directors of Eastside Projects, Birmingham. She is currently Professor at NABA (Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti) Milan. The work of Condorelli is fundamentally informed by architecture, a discipline in which the artist holds numerous degrees, including a PhD from Goldsmiths College in London.
01/03/2016
A lecture by Anne Barlow, Director of Art in General, New York. This is the inaugural presentation in a series of lectures running throughout the year titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do?'
At Art in General, Barlow has most recently curated projects with artists Basim Magdy, Sara Greenberger Rafferty, Jill Magid, Shezad Dawood, Meriç Algün Ringborg, Anetta Mona Chişa and Lucia Tkáčová, and launched Art in General’s annual curatorial conference What Now? Barlow also curated of Tactics for the Here and Now, the 5th Bucharest Biennale, Bucharest, Romania, 2012, and co-curated the Latvian Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale, 2013. From 1999 to 2006, Barlow was Curator of Education and Media Programs at the New Museum, New York, where she organised numerous exhibitions and performances, and initiated and developed its Museum as Hub program. Originally from Glasgow, Scotland, Barlow was formerly Curator of Contemporary Art and Design at Glasgow Museums, where she managed its contemporary art collection, exhibitions program, artists’ residencies, and new commissions. Barlow has published with The Journal for Curatorial Studies, Toronto; The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, Philadelphia; Ibraaz; the New Museum, New York; and Tate Modern, London, among others, she has lectured or moderated talks at organisations including the Royal College of Art, London; Centre for Contemporary Art, Warsaw; MUMOK, Vienna; IASPIS, Stockholm; and the Sharjah Art Foundation.
Anne Barlow’s visit is generously supported by the Australia Council for the Arts.
05/02/2015
Prince has been the Executive Director of the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver, Canada, since 2011. Prior to this he was Curator at Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, UK, where he was responsible for an international program, making solo exhibitions and publications with artists including Arturo Herrera, Donald Judd, Olafur Eliasson, Andrea Zittel, Martin Boyce, Shahzia Sikander, Ryan Gander, Victor Man, Marcel Dzama, Steven Shearer and Susan Philipsz amongst many others. His exhibition of paintings and drawings by Cuban artist Carmen Herrera in 2009 was critically heralded as the ’discovery of the decade’ by newspapers The Guardian/Observer in the UK and The New York Times.
A talk by curator Stephanie Rosenthal. This is the ninth presentation in a series of talks running throughout the year titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do?' Rosenthal has held the position of Chief Curator at the Hayward Gallery in London, UK, since 2007, and she is the Artistic Director of the forthcoming 20th Biennale of Sydney.
20/11/2015
IMA’s Operations Manager, Madeleine King looks at current exhibitions Dale Harding: 'White Collared' and Patrick Staff: 'The Foundation' through the lens of fashion.
19/09/2015
The IMA is pleased to present a talk by art historian Ian McLean. This is the seventh presentation in a series of talks running throughout the year titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do?', and features a response by Brisbane artist, Richard Bell.
26/09/2015
Panel discussions addressing the role and function of the art institution, through case-studies of art institutions and institutions by artists, and reflections on publics and publicness. Leading artists, writers, and curators such as Callum Morton, Monica Narula, Maud Page, Nikos Papastergiadis, and Courtney Pedersen;
Panel discussions addressing the role and function of the art institution, through case-studies of art institutions and institutions by artists. Leading artists, writers, and curators such as Peter Anderson; Sean Dockray; Courtney Pedersen; Ann Stephen
Melbourne-based art historian and writer Helen Hughes responds to keynote lecture by Pittsburgh, New York, and Sydney-based art historian and writer Terry Smith that reflects on Australian and international independent art spaces in 1975 and today.
11/07/2015
A keynote lecture by Pittsburgh, New York, and Sydney-based art historian and writer Terry Smith that reflects on Australian and international independent art spaces in 1975 and today. 11/07/2015
This is the sixth presentation in a series of talks running throughout the year titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do'?
Born in Poland, Lewandowska now divides her time between London, UK, and Hong Kong. Through collaborative projects she has explored the public function of archives, collections and exhibitions in an age of privatisation. She was Professor of Art in the Public Realm at Konstfack, Stockholm 2003–2013, where she established Timeline: Artists’ Film and Video Archive. In 2014 she was Visiting Professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Throughout 2014/15 she is Artist in Residence at the Asia Art Archive in Hong Kong.
A talk by Elizabeth Ann Macgregor OBE, Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA). This is the fifth presentation in a series of talks running throughout the year titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do?'
Originally from Dundee, Scotland, Macgregor has been Director of the MCA since 1999. After negotiating a new funding model to allow the MCA to flourish, she has consolidated the MCA’s position as one of Sydney’s best loved institutions, engaging audiences with living artists. A bold, new and significantly expanded MCA opened in 2012. The redevelopment transformed the MCA, providing spacious new galleries including an entire floor dedicated to the MCA Collection; a state-of-the-art National Centre for Creative Learning; public spaces that embrace one of the world’s most beautiful locations and a series of site-specific artists’ commissions. Macgregor’s contribution to the visual arts has been recognised with an OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List in 2011 and the 2011 Australia Council Visual Arts Medal.
An artist talk by Patrick Staff followed by a conversation with IMA’s Executive Directors Aileen Burns and Johan Lundh. This talk took place at the IMA Thursday, 13 August, at 6pm.
Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art’s Curator of Indigenous Art Bruce McLean in-conversation with Brisbane-based artist Vernon Ah Kee. McLean has worked with Ah Kee on a number of occasions, including My Country, I Still Call Australia Home: Contemporary Art from Black Australia (2013) at QAGOMA. For this event, they discuss Ah Kee’s practice, engaging specifically with his new work for Imaginary Accord.
The IMA presents a talk by Charles Esche, Director of the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, The Netherlands. This is the forth presentation in a series of talks running throughout the year titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do?'
Esche has been a leading voice in curatorial practice for two decades, and has been directing the Van Abbemuseum since 2004. In 2014, Esche was awarded Bard College’s Audrey Irmas Award for Curatorial Excellence. The prize honors multiple things including his endless commitment to rethinking what art can do and redefining what it can be. Esche has been involved in exhibitions such as Strange and Close at CAPC, Bordeaux (2011); An Idea for Living at the U3 Slovene Triennale (2011); the 2nd and 3rd RIWAQ Biennials in Ramallah, Palestine (2007/2009); the 9th International Istanbul Biennial (2005); and the 4th Gwangju Biennale, Republic of Korea (2002). He curated the 31st Sao Paulo Bienale which opened in the autumn of 2014.
Chris Saines, Director of the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, presents the second of a series of talks titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do?', followed by a conversation with Johan Lundh, Co-Director of the IMA.
Saines has 30 years’ experience in Australian and New Zealand galleries as a director, curatorial and collection manager, educator and curator. He commenced as Director of the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern (QAGOMA) in April 2013, having previously been Director of Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki from 1996–2013. He led that institution’s $125 million redevelopment, which opened in 2011 and won World Building of the Year 2013. Previously, Mr Saines spent 11 years at Queensland Art Gallery, eight of them as Manager of Curatorial Services. He re-joined QAGOMA as Director with a commitment to internally curating major exhibitions both from the Collection and with leading international artists, and to touring Collection exhibitions nationally and internationally. His vision is for QAGOMA to be the leading museum for the contemporary art of Australia, Asia and the Pacific.
A talk by Misal Adnan Yildiz, Director of Artspace NZ. This is the third presentation in a series of talks running throughout the year titled 'What Can Art Institutions Do?'
Yildiz has been the Director of Artspace NZ since November 2014. Previously, he was the Artistic Director of Künstlerhaus Stuttgart between 2011 and 2014, one of curatorial collaborators of Fulya Erdemci for the 13th Istanbul Biennial (2013), and manifested A History of Inspiration as part of Nouvelle Vagues, Summer program 2013 at Palais de Tokyo, Paris.
In February 2015 the IMA hosted a series of lectures and artist’s presentations titled 'Factory/studio/tumblr*' that responded to Hito Steyerl’s exhibition 'Too Much World' (13 December 2014–22 March 2015).
As part of the symposium artist Zach Blas speaks on the notion of the contra–internet and puts his theory into context by sharing details of some of his recent participatory anti-surveillance artworks.
*Event title taken from Hito Steyerls e-flux journal essay, “Too Much World: Is the Internet Dead?“ (no 492013).
The IMA presents a talk titled 'Fiction and the Future Anterior' by Berlin-based artist and writer Patricia Reed.
Reed’s artworks have been featured in exhibitions at the Witte de With, Rotterdam; Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin; Kunsthaus Langenthal, Langenthal; Württembergische Kunstverein, Stuttgart; Audain Gallery, Vancouver; and 0047, Oslo, among others. As a writer, Reed has contributed to several books and periodicals, including #ACCELERATE: The Accelerationist Reader; The Psychopathologies of Cognitive Capitalism Vol. II; Mould Magazine; Who Told You So?!; Intangible Economies; Cognitive Architecture: From Biopolitics to Noopolitics; Critical Spatial Practice; C Magazine; Fillip, Art Papers, Shifter, and Framework. Lectures have included those at The Future Summit – Montréal Biennale; Tate Britain, London; University of Westminster; Dampfzentrale, Bern; Artists Space, New York; MIT, Massachusetts; abc, Berlin; Archive Kabinett, Berlin; and The Winter School Middle East, Kuwait. Reed plays host to the Inclinations lecture series at Or Gallery in Berlin. She teaches and is a board member for The New Centre for Research & Practice, and is part of the Laboria Cuboniks working group.