Primavera 2025: Young Australian Artists @ MCA Australia, Sydney - Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

Primavera 2025: Young Australian Artists

MCA Australia, Sydney

5 September 2025 - 8 March 2026 

EMMALINE ZANELLI

Magic Cave, 2024 

6.5 x 4 x 2.4 m, bird, mouse, rat, cat, dog and 

hermit crab cages, plastic tunnels, toys, LED lights

Installation view, Firstdraft, Sydney

© and courtesy of the artist

Primavera is the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia's annual exhibition of young Australian artists aged 35 and under. Now in its 34th year, Primavera continues to be a significant platform for early-career Australian artists and curators to present exciting new work. Since its inception, the exhibition series has presented the work of more than 250 artists and 30 curators and propelled the careers of many of Australia’s most significant artists. Primavera was initiated in 1992 by Dr Edward Jackson AM, Mrs Cynthia Jackson AM and their family in memory of their daughter and sister Belinda, a talented jeweller who died at the age of 29.

The Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA Australia) announces the five artists to exhibit in Primavera 2025: Young Australian Artists, Francis Carmody (VIC/NSW), Alexandra Peters (VIC), Augusta Vinall Richardson (VIC), Keemon Williams (QLD) and Emmaline Zanelli (SA).

Primavera 2025: Young Australian Artists is curated by MCA Australia Curator, Tim Riley Walsh. The artist selection is driven by the theme of society’s relationship to industry and the machine in the contemporary era. The work of the five artists address es technology and mechanical intertwinement in various ways.

About Primavera 2025, Riley Walsh said: 'The selected artists for Primavera 2025 reflect the innovation and sheer talent of the emerging contemporary Australian art world. Over the course of close to 50 studio visits I conducted across the country I saw intriguing shifts in how young practitioners are engaging with a rapidly changing sociopolitical and technological landscape. How this translates into creative practice is the focus of this presentation.'

'My ongoing interest as a curator is art’s power to make us look anew at subjects that typically evade representation or understanding. What is out of view or exceeds our senses. These five artists help broaden our world view and begin to unravel the complexity of the current era.'

Primavera 2025: Young Australian Artists - About the artists

FRANCIS CARMODY

Photo: Tim Herbertson

Francis Carmody 

Born 1998, Gadigal Country/Sydney. Lives and works Naarm/Melbourne 

Francis Carmody thinks of his practice as a form of speculative storytelling. He considers the social structures that underpin our current reality to understand our past and to imagine possible futures. Carmody’s work spans mediums and engages collaborators with expertise across diverse disciplines to investigate historical and natural phenomena. Francis Carmody received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne. Between 2022–2024 he was a Gertrude Studio Artist at Gertrude Contemporary, Naarm/Melbourne. Recently he has exhibited work at Gertrude Glasshouse, Conners Conners, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art and Mejia, all located in Naarm/Melbourne.  

FRANCIS CARMODY

Black Swan Event: Incubating (detail), 2024 

Plaster, horsehair, polymer paint, nylon, 

60 x 60 x 30 cm

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Christian Capurro

FRANCIS CARMODY

A Relic Remains, 2023 

Installation view, Gertrude Glasshouse, Collingwood 

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Christian Capurro

Alexandra Peters 

Born 1990, Warrnambool. Lives and works Naarm/Melbourne 

Alexandra Peters is a multidisciplinary artist living and working in Naarm/Melbourne. Her work spans painting, print, sculpture and assemblage, often taking the form of an installation. These arrangements explore the field of expanded painting through the interrogation of support structures and framing devices. Peters completed a Bachelor of Fine Art (Honours) at Monash University, Melbourne in 2022, where she was the recipient of the Monash University Museum of Art Award and the Megalo Print Award. Her works have been exhibited throughout Australia and internationally and include recent commissioned presentations at the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne and Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne. She has also been featured in exhibitions by 1301SW, Melbourne; Asbestos, Melbourne; NAP Contemporary, Mildura; Perth Institute of Contemporary Art; and Propaganda Network, Tbilisi, Georgia. She is currently part of the studio program at Gertrude Contemporary.

ALEXANDRA PETERS 

Breakneck: Blowback (Source), 2024

Acrylic and water-based ink with screen-print 

medium and paste on leatherette, 250 x 180 cm

(2-panels, each 250 x 90 cm) 

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Andrew Curtis

ALEXANDRA PETERS

Installation view, Future Remains: 

The 2024 Macfarlane Commissions, 

Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, 

Naarm/Melbourne, 2024 

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Andrew Curtis

ALEXANDRA PETERS

Breakneck: Fenestration (Auto-Extrication), 2024

Acrylic and water-based ink with screen-print 

medium and paste on leatherette,

250 x 480 cm (4-panels, each 250 x 120 cm) 

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Andrew Curtis

AUGUSTA VINALL RICHARDSON

© the artist. Courtesy The Commercial, Sydney

Photo: Lucy Foster

Augusta Vinall Richardson 

Born 1991, Naarm/Melbourne. Lives and works Naarm/Melbourne 

Augusta Vinall Richardson makes abstract composite sculptures out of sheet and cast metals, employing industrial materials and processes in a practice underpinned by an ethics of responsibility for objects. Her works recall legacies of minimalism but celebrate irregularities and imperfections, investing especially in textural qualities. Her process begins with hand drawings or the building of cardboard and papier-mâché maquettes. In 2022 Vinall Richardson was awarded a Master of Fine Art by Monash University, Naarm/Melbourne. She has exhibited at La Trobe Art Institute, Djaara/Bendigo, and in the 2024 Melbourne Sculpture Biennial. In 2026, she will present a solo exhibition at Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne. She is represented by The Commercial, Sydney.

AUGUSTA VINALL RICHARDSON

Box Sculpture (side by side), 2025

Stainless steel, 150kg approx., 226 x 99 x 23 cm

© the artist. Courtesy The Commercial, Sydney. 

Photo: Andrew Curtis

AUGUSTA VINALL RICHARDSON

Day by day, 2025 

Bronze, patina, 120kg approx., 93 x 215 x 18 cm 

Private collection, Melbourne

© the artist. Courtesy The Commercial, Sydney

Photo: Andrew Curtis

KEEMON WILLIAMS

Photo: Sam Harrison

Keemon Williams 

Kuku Yalanji, Koa, Meriam, and South Sea Islander peoples. Born 1999, Gimuy/Cairns. Lives and works Magandjin/Brisbane 

Keemon Williams is a Koa, Kuku Yalanji, Meriam Mir and South Sea Islander artist and curator based in Magandjin/Brisbane. His practice considers queer, Indigenous and Australian experiences as lived in the shadow of colonisation. His work often draws on the language of production, as well as memory and humour. Williams has presented solo exhibitions at Kuiper Projects, Brisbane, Milani Carpark Gallery, Brisbane and Northsite Contemporary Arts, Cairns. His work has been featured at the National Gallery of Victoria; Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane; UQ Art Museum, Brisbane; QUT Art Museum, Brisbane; Griffith University Art Museum, Brisbane; and Museum of Brisbane. Williams is currently Assistant Curator, Indigenous Australian Art at QAGOMA, Brisbane. He was previously the Exhibitions Officer at Outer Space in Brisbane from 2022–2025. He graduated from Queensland University of Technology with a BFA (Visual Art) in 2019. 

KEEMON WILLIAMS

Installation view, Boomerangs, 2023

Wurrdha Marra, The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia, 2023 

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Tom Ross

KEEMON WILLIAMS

Business is Boomin’, 2021

Porcelain, underglaze, glaze, epoxy, 55 x 45 mm 

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Kyle Weise

KEEMON WILLIAMS

Business is Boomin’, 2021

Porcelain, underglaze, glaze, epoxy, 55 x 45 mm 

© and courtesy of the artist. Photo: Kyle Weise

EMMALINE ZANELLI

Photo: Thomas McCammon

Emmaline Zanelli 

Born 1994, Tarndanya/Adelaide. Lives and works Tarndanya/Adelaide

Emmaline Zanelli’s work combines elements of video, photography, sculpture and performance. Influenced by absurdism and surrealism, she creates art that seeks humour and meaning in the everyday. Recently, her work has considered themes of labour and youth culture. Emmaline Zanelli completed a Bachelor of Visual Arts at Adelaide College of the Arts in Tarndanya/Adelaide in 2015, and a MA in Photography at the Photography Studies College in Naarm/Melbourne in 2021. Her work has been exhibited in galleries across Australia, including Stills Gallery, Sydney, Perth Institute of Contemporary Art, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Naarm/Melbourne, and the Art Gallery of South Australia, Tarndanya/Adelaide. Her work has been published in the British Journal of Photography and Süddeutsche Zeitung Magazin, and screened at the Arles Photography Festival in France. In 2022 her video work Dynamic Drills (2019–2021) was selected as the winner of The Churchie Emerging Art Prize. 

EMMALINE ZANELLI

Magic Cave, 2024 

6.5 x 4 x 3.8 m, bird, mouse, rat, cat, dog and 

hermit crab cages, plastic tunnels, toys, LED lights

Installation view, Studios: 2024, 

Adelaide Contemporary Experimental 

© and courtesy of the artist

EMMALINE ZANELLI

I take care of what’s mine (still), 2023–2024

Two channel video, sound, 25:47 minutes, 

Commissioned by Adelaide Film Festival X UniSA 

Samstag Museum of Art EXPAND Lab, 

Supported by Creative Australia 

© and courtesy of the artist

EMMALINE ZANELLI

I take care of what’s mine (still), 2023–2024

Two channel video, sound, 25:47 minutes, 

Commissioned by Adelaide Film Festival X UniSA 

Samstag Museum of Art EXPAND Lab, 

Supported by Creative Australia 

© and courtesy of the artist

EMMALINE ZANELLI

I take care of what’s mine (still), 2023–2024

Two channel video, sound, 25:47 minutes, 

Commissioned by Adelaide Film Festival X UniSA 

Samstag Museum of Art EXPAND Lab, 

Supported by Creative Australia 

© and courtesy of the artist

Primavera 2025: Young Australian Artists - Curator Tim Riley Walsh

TIM RILEY WALSH

Photo: Hamish McIntosh

Primavera 2025 Curator, Tim Riley Walsh, is Assistant Curator at the MCA Australia. Previously, he was Curator in Residence, Gertrude, Naarm/Melbourne, and held roles at Camden Art Centre, London and Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Magandjin/Brisbane. Riley Walsh’s MCA Australia curatorial projects include Data Dreams: Contemporary Art in the Age of AI (2025, co-curator), MCA Collection: Artists in Focus (2025, curatorium) and supporting the presentations of Hiroshi Sugimoto: Time Machine (2024) and Tarek Atoui: Waters’ Witness (2023–24). Outside of the MCA, his recent external projects include Unbecoming, La Trobe Art Institute, Djaara/Bendigo (2025) and You Are Here Too, Institute of Modern Art, Magandjin/Brisbane (co-curator, 2025).

MCA AUSTRALIA

Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

Tallawoladah, Gadigal Country

140 George Street, The Rocks, Sydney NSW 2000

www.mca.com

Hoor Al Qasimi, Biennale of Sydney 2026, Artistic Director

Hoor Al Qasimi appointed as Artistic Director of the 25th Biennale of Sydney, 2026

HOOR AL QASIMI

Photograph: Daniel Boud

HOOR AL QASIMI has been appointed as the Artistic Director of the Biennale of Sydney, scheduled to take place from 7 March to 8 June 2026. Hoor Al Qasimi will collaborate with local communities, artists and academics, whilst drawing on her own international network, to develop and realise the concept for the 25th edition of the Biennale.

As a curator, Hoor Al Qasimi’s focuses on the histories of each place she works in, creating multidisciplinary programming with a collaborative approach and emphasis on supporting experimentation and innovation in the arts. For more than 20 years, she has worked extensively with various mediums including film, music, performance, publications, to bring together all forms of art in conversation.

‘Sydney has a multicultural community at its core, with people from different cultures from across the world choosing and calling this vibrant city as their home,’ said Hoor Al Qasimi. ‘I’m interested in exploring the multifaceted cultures and perspectives within this city, working with local artists and communities as well as bringing new voices to the Biennale. It is an honour and privilege to be nominated and then selected to be Artistic Director of the 25th Biennale of Sydney, which I have been visiting for over a decade now. I have seen the developments over the years, including the amplification of Indigenous voices both local and global, which has made it an essential platform for rewriting art history.’

Hoor Al Qasimi is the President and Director Sharjah Art Foundation, an organisation she founded in 2009 as a catalyst and advocate for the arts around the world. She has been the Director of Sharjah Biennial since 2002, an internationally recognised platform for contemporary artists, curators and cultural producers, and curated Sharjah Biennial 15 in 2023. She was appointed as the President of the International Biennial Association (IBA) in 2017 and serves as the President of The Africa Institute, Global Studies University, Sharjah and President and Director of the Sharjah Architecture Triennial. Al Qasimi was appointed as the Artistic Director of the sixth Aichi Triennale (2025) last July, becoming the first person to be chosen for the role from outside of Japan. She has also co-curated exhibitions at leading organisations around the world, including the Serpentine Gallery in London and the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

Source: Sharjah Art Foundation

www.sharjahart.org

Biennale of Sydney 2024 @ The White Bay Power Station - Artists + Artworks

Biennale of Sydney 2024 

@ The White Bay Power Station

9 March - 10 June 2024

Cosmin Costinaș and Inti Guerrero

24th Biennale of Sydney 2024 Artistic Directors 

at The White Bay Power Station 

Photograph by Joshua Morris

Biennale of Sydney 2024

Artistic Directors Cosmin Costinaș and Inti Guerrero

Media Launch at The White Bay Power Station

Photograph by Daniel Boud

Biennale of Sydney 2024 

Media Launch at The White Bay Power Station

Photograph by Daniel Boud

The White Bay Power Station was constructed between 1912 ans 1917. It remained in service until 1984. The White Bay Power Station will be one of the locations of the 24th Biennale of Sydney 2024.

The announced artists on view at The White Bay Power Station for the 24th Biennale of Sydney 2024 include Dylan Mooney, Darrell Sibosado, the collective VNS Matrix, Martin Wong.

Dylan Mooney

Photo: Rhett Hammerton. Courtesy of the artist

Dylan Mooney

Grevillea Venusta – Grevillea (from the Intertwined series), 2022

Digital illustration hand-painted with Yuwi ochre, 120 x 88cm

Image courtesy of the artist and N. Smith Gallery, Sydney

Dylan Mooney

Still Thriving (from the Still Thriving series), 2023

Digital illustration hand-painted with Yuwi ochre, 118.9 x 84.1cm

Image courtesy of the artist and N. Smith Gallery, Sydney

Dylan Mooney

Our Islands, Our Homes, 2021

Digital illustration printed on 320gsm cotton paper, 84.1 x 59.4cm

Image courtesy of the artist and N. Smith Gallery, Sydney

Artist DYLAN MOONEY, a Yuwi, Torres Strait and South Sea Islander man from Mackay (North Queensland). Working across painting, printmaking, digital illustration and drawing, the artist is known for his high-impact illustrative style with bright, saturated colour, creating works influenced by history, culture and family. He will create a large-scale mural celebrating the life of the late queer, First Nations dancer and activist Malcolm Cole, who led the first Aboriginal float at the 1988 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade. Through this new commission, Dylan Mooney will commemorate Malcolm Cole’s life and activism in the queer and Aboriginal communities.

Darrell Sibosado

Photography:The National Gallery of Australia

Darrell Sibosado

Aalingoon (Rainbow Serpent), 2019

Corten Steel, 550 x 300 cm 

Collection of the Art Gallery of South Australia

Photographer: N. Smith Gallery

Courtesy the artist and N.Smith Gallery, Sydney

© Darrell Sibosado

Darrell Sibosado

Ngarrgidj Morr (the proper path to follow), 2022

Powder-coated steel, LED tubes, fittings, electrical component

300 x 245 x 8 cm (each panel)

Collection of The National Gallery of Australia

Photographer: The National Gallery of Australia

© Darrell Sibosado

Darrell Sibosado

Gulgan (Fishtrap), 2014

Etching printed in red ink on paper

39.7 x 30.3 cm

Courtesy the artist and N.Smith Gallery, Sydney

© Darrell Sibosado

 

DARRELL SIBOSADO is a Bard man from Lombadina, situated on the Dampier Peninsula of the Kimberley coast, Western Australia. His practice explores the innovative potential of the riji (pearl shell) designs within a contemporary context. Passed down over countless generations, the designs represent the detached scales of Aalingoon, the Rainbow Snake, as he rests on the ocean surface, shedding his scales containing traditional knowledge and beliefs. Through his printmaking and installations, Sibosado reflects on traditional Bard lore and is intent on reiterating that Aboriginal culture is a living, adaptive culture that undeniably commands a presence in the contemporary space. For the 24th Biennale of Sydney, Sibosado will create a neon work centred around the meticulous preparations and movements orchestrated in harmony with the rich traditions and deeply rooted networks of kinship, obligations and interpersonal relationships that are fostered within Sibosado’s community.

VNS Matrix

Image courtesy the artists

VNS Matrix

Viral Pleasure World [still] (from ‘VNS Matrix Virtual Theme Parks’),1996

Commissioned by Performance Space Sydney 

in association with the Australian Film Commission 

Image courtesy the artists

VNS Matrix

Corpusfantastica [still] (from ‘Bad Code’), 1997 

Digital image

Image courtesy the artists

 

Australian (Adelaide/Tarntanya) feminist art collective VNS Matrix emerged in 1991 to challenge the male-dominated culture of technology and cyberspace. Their installations, happenings, posters, games, and manifestos explore the sexual, political, and aesthetic dimensions of gendered relationships with technology. They coined the term cyberfeminism to capture their radical vision of empowerment, embodiment, and resistance in the digital age. Notable works including A Cyberfeminist Manifesto for the 21st Century have been widely translated and circulated. Their legacy continues to manifest, inspiring new generations of artists and activists. VNS Matrix is Josephine Starrs, Julianne Pierce, Francesca da Rimini, and Virginia Barratt. 

Chief Executive Officer of Biennale of Sydney Barbara Moore said: “We are thrilled to be hosting the first major event at White Bay Power Station. Admission is free. We are presenting some of the best contemporary art from around the world and across Australia, with a robust program of music and food too, and we can't wait for you to experience it. For 50 years, the Biennale of Sydney has brought people together to think about and talk about the world we live in, infusing art into the very fabric of Sydney and rejuvenated public spaces across the city. In March, we swing the doors to White Bay Power Station wide open, and we can't wait for you to be part of it.”

Minister for the Arts John Graham said: “The Biennale of Sydney at White Bay Power Station will be a major event on the international stage and will draw people from all over the world to view the work of some of the best local, national and international artists in a magnificent new space, with free admission for all.

“The event will harness Bays West’s rich First Nations, multicultural and industrial histories into the iconic location, serving as a world-class destination for people visiting Sydney.”

Chief Executive of Placemaking NSW Anita Mitchell said: “Placemaking NSW is delighted to have secured Biennale of Sydney as the first free public activation at the site.

“The opening of White Bay Power Station is the first step in the transformation of the Bays West precinct in line with the Bays West Place Strategy.”

Minister for Planning and Public Spaces Paul Scully said: “White Bay Power Station was powering Sydney’s trams and dominating the harbour skyline before the Harbour Bridge and then Opera House captured our attention.

“While planning is underway for its long-term future, we are taking this opportunity to let the community immerse themselves in the site, through a program of events and activations, starting with the Biennale of Sydney.”

The White Bay Power Station, Sydney

YouTube Screen Shot

For a short history of The White Bay Power Station since its construction, you can look at a short video on YouTube realized by the NSW Department of Planning and Environment:

https://youtu.be/mKdONUWzxWk

BIENNALE OF SYDNEY

biennaleofsydney.art

Margel Hinder @ Art Gallery of NSW, Sydney & Heide Museum of Modern Art, Bulleen - Modern in Motion

Margel Hinder: Modern in Motion

Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney

30 January – 2 May 2021

Heide Museum of Modern Art, Bulleen

30 June – 10 October 2021

MARGEL HINDER 

Revolving construction 1957

Art Gallery of New South Wales, purchased 1959 

© AGNSW

The Art Gallery of New South Wales presents Margel Hinder: Modern in Motion, the first retrospective of one of Australia’s most important and dynamic, yet underrated, modernist sculptors of the 20th century.

The exhibition, presented in collaboration with Heide Museum of Modern Art in Melbourne, showcases an arresting array of sculptures by Margel Hinder (1905 – 1995) produced over five decades of her career.

From the solidity and volume of her wood carvings in the 1930s, to the ‘space age’ kinetic and wire works of the 1950s and her major public commissions in the 1960s, Margel Hinder: Modern in Motion traces the development of Margel Hinder’s creative vision and her exploration of sculptural languages.

Art Gallery of NSW director Dr Michael Brand said the exhibition aims to rectify Margel Hinder’s profile as one of the most underestimated Australian sculptors of the 20th century.

“Margel Hinder was an agent for cultural change and part of the first generation of abstract artists in Australia. This important retrospective reveals how vital Hinder was in the making of Sydney’s modernism and for asserting the place of sculpture within it,” Brand said.

Margel Hinder: Modern in Motion is co-curated by Art Gallery of NSW senior curator of Australian art Denise Mimmocchi and Heide Museum of Modern Art artistic director Lesley Harding.

Lesley Harding said the exhibition uncovers the expansive nature of Margel Hinder’s creativity, and her skill in giving sculptural form to universal concepts like time and motion in materials expressive of the era.

“Apart from her inclusion in a few surveys of local modernism, Hinder’s vanguard practice and its legacy have largely been overlooked since the 1980s. This exhibition presents her innovative and visually arresting sculpture to new generations and the wide audience it deserves.”

Denise Mimmocchi said the exhibition is an opportunity to explore the breadth and depth of Hinder’s oeuvre.

“Margel Hinder: Modern in Motion brings together major sculptures from public and private collections, immersive representations of public sculptures, maquettes, drawings and archival photographs to present an insightful portrait of the pioneering sculptor’s life and work.”

“The Art Gallery of NSW has a substantial collection of Hinder’s maquettes that reveal incredible details of her creative processes. We are excited to have recently completed conservation on more than 40 of these maquettes so that they can be exhibited,” said Denise Mimmocchi.

Born in Brooklyn, New York, Margel Hinder (née Harris) initiated her sculpture studies in Buffalo and Boston. She migrated to Australia in 1934, following her marriage to Australian artist Frank Hinder, where her mature practice flourished.

Exhibition highlights include Margel Hinder’s commanding kinetic works, whose slow rotations encapsulate a sense of the world in perpetual motion, and an immersive installation based on two of Hinder’s major public sculptures.

Created by environment designer and 3D artist Andrew Yip, the life-size digital reconstructions are of two of the most significant public sculptures of Hinder’s career: the Civic Park fountain, Newcastle 1961–66 and the now decommissioned Northpoint fountain 1975. This project allows for a presence of this important component of Hinder’s art within the context of her retrospective while also demonstrating the dramatic shift in the style and scope of Hinder’s art in monumental and water kinetic sculpture.

The exhibition is accompanied by the richly illustrated publication Margel Hinder: Modern in Motion featuring essays by Denise Mimmocchi; Lesley Harding; Art Gallery of NSW object conservator Melanie Barrett; and Centre for Postdigital Cultures, Coventry University assistant professor of immersive media, Dr Andrew Yip; and a foreword by University of Oxford professor of the history of art Dr Geoffrey Batchen.

Margel Hinder: Modern in Motion is presented at the Art Gallery of NSW and will tour to Heide Museum of Modern Art.

ART GALLERY OF NEW SOUTH WALES

Art Gallery Road, The Domain, Sydney

www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au

HEIDE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART

7 Templestowe Road, Bulleen VIC 3105

www.heide.com.au

Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium @ LACMA, Getty Museum, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney...

Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium 
LACMA - Los Angeles County Museum of Art
March 20 - July 31, 2016
J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles 
March 15 - July 31, 2016 
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
September 10, 2016 - January 15, 2017 
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 
October 28, 2017 - February 4, 2018

Robert Mapplethorpe, Lisa Lyon, 1982 

Gelatin silver print

Promised gift of The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation to The J. Paul Getty Trust 

and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art 

© Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) presents Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium, a major retrospective examining the work and career of one of the most influential visual artists of the 20th century. Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium is co-organized by LACMA and the J. Paul Getty Museum. In a historic collaboration, the two institutions will trace the artist’s working methods and materials, presenting the improvisational, experimental aspects of his practice alongside the refined perfection of his prints. The works on display provide new context for understanding the key genres that Mapplethorpe pursued: portraiture, the nude, and still life. His personal connections to sitters, his ability to manage a  successful studio, and his ambition to elevate photography to the status of contemporary art will be demonstrated through rarely seen correspondence, books, and other ephemera, including those from the artist’s archive held by the Getty Research Institute. 

Robert Mapplethorpe, Self-Portrait, 1980 

Gelatin silver print

Promised gift of The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation to The J. Paul Getty Trust 

and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art 

© Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation

LACMA’s presentation (March 20–July 31, 2016) focuses on Mapplethorpe’s working methods, sources, and creative processes—the experimental and performative aspects of his work—while the J. Paul Getty Museum (March 15–July 31, 2016) highlights the artist’s disciplined studio practice, figure studies, and legacy. Between the two museums, more than 300 works by Mapplethorpe will be on view, making this one of the largest-ever presentations of his work. The objects on view in Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium are drawn almost entirely from the landmark joint acquisition of art and archival materials made in 2011 by the J. Paul Getty Trust and LACMA from The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. 

Robert Mapplethorpe, Patti Smith, 1978 

Gelatin silver print

Promised gift of The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation to The J. Paul Getty Trust 

and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art 

© Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation

"4 years ago LACMA and the Getty came together to jointly acquire the art and archives of Robert Mapplethorpe," said Michael Govan, LACMA CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director. "It has been an exciting collaboration ever since, as our researchers, conservators, and curators have all spent time with this trove of Mapplethorpe's art. Now, we are glad to present this large-scale joint exhibition to Los Angeles and the world."

“Through this historic collaboration, the LACMA and J. Paul Getty Museum exhibitions offer a new perspective on this influential artist,” said Britt Salvesen, curator and head of the Wallis Annenberg Photography department. “Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium reveals the rich resources of the Mapplethorpe archive, which provides a broader context for the iconic images that brought him fame. Mapplethorpe’s refined style challenged viewers to consider his portraits, flowers, and sexually explicit images as equal expressions of a personal vision. His drive to capture the perfect moment is the core of his art.”

Following its Los Angeles debut, Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium will travel internationally beginning with the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in Canada (September 10, 2016–January 15, 2017), the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, (October 28, 2017–February 4, 2018), and another international venue. This will be the first major traveling retrospective in North America since the landmark exhibition The Perfect Moment, organized in 1988 by the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia.

The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated book, Robert Mapplethorpe: The Photographs, co-published by LACMA and the J. Paul Getty Museum. A comprehensive guide to the artist's work and career, this publication will feature an introduction by cocurators Britt Salvesen and Paul Martineau, five scholarly essays, an illustrated chronology, and a selected exhibition history and bibliography. The J. Paul Getty Museum presentation is curated by Paul Martineau, associate curator of photographs.

Exhibition Organization

The LACMA presentation is organized in five thematic sections. The first gallery establishes Mapplethorpe in the milieu of 1970s and 1980s urban gay culture, depicting himself and his models openly declaring their sexuality through clothing, body adornment, and gesture. The second gallery highlights the work Mapplethorpe created in the late 1960s and early 1970s before he took up photography in earnest. As a student of graphic design at the Pratt Institute, he demonstrated an early facility for draftsmanship and a penchant for geometric composition. He designed jewelry and temporary assemblages using items of clothing. Inspired by Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, and Robert Rauschenberg, he also experimented with collages and constructions, often incorporating Catholic iconography and appropriated imagery from homosexual periodicals.

Robert Mapplethorpe borrowed a Polaroid camera from a friend in 1970 and, over the course of the next year, honed his vision as a photographer. These early unique images, installed in the third gallery, reveal his observational acuity and his ability to be in the moment. Mapplethorpe was one of his own best subjects, as his many self-portraits attest, and he was open about being a participant in the scenarios he depicted. The fourth gallery focuses on Mapplethorpe’s engagement with the leather and bondage community, his appropriation of pornographic source material, and his exploration of the African American male nude. Additionally, this gallery features ephemera relating to Robert Mapplethorpe’s first breakout exhibitions in New York, including a joint exhibition at The Kitchen and Holly Solomon Gallery in 1977. The fifth gallery presents work from the mid-1980s, when Mapplethorpe was running a successful studio and producing many commissioned portraits. Among his favorite subjects were the artists, musicians, and other performers he first encountered in the downtown art scene in the ’70s. He commented that photography was “the perfect medium for the 70s and 80s, when everything was fast. If I were to make something that took two weeks to do, I’d lose my enthusiasm. It would become an act of labor and the love would be gone.” 

Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium: Exhibition Highlights

Robert Mapplethorpe, Self-portrait (1980)

Robert Mapplethorpe’s turn to photography in the early 1970s coincided with his embrace of New York’s leather subculture, and, throughout the decade, he explored the potential of both forms of expression simultaneously. His 1980 self-portrait as a surly, smoking leatherman captures the hyper masculine posturing that was concomitant with the choice of leather as a fashion statement and as a sexual fetish. Staring defiantly into the camera, Robert Mapplethorpe declares his participation in the leather community. At the same time, the photograph expresses the playful and performative aspects of his studio practice. An element of dress-up and theater is evident in much of his portraiture. This self-portrait shows the artist posing in the role of an archetypal tough-guy—a greaser complete with popped collar, a lit cigarette dangling from his lip, and hair styled into a pompadour. 

Robert Mapplethorpe, Patti Smith (1978)

Robert Mapplethorpe was studying art at the Pratt Institute, in Brooklyn, when he met Patti Smith in spring 1967. Mapplethorpe and Smith spent the next decade in close proximity, inspiring one another's artistic aspirations. Mapplethorpe chose photography as his medium in the early 1970s, whereas Smith gravitated toward poetry and music, and the two collaborated in a number of portrait sessions. Here, Smith poses in the act of cutting her hair, a gesture of defiance. As she explained in a 1975 interview, she didn't "want to walk around New York looking like a folk-singer. I like rock 'n' roll. So I got hundreds of pictures of Keith Richards, and I hung them up and then just took scissors and chopped away until I had a real Rolling Stones haircut." Mapplethorpe captured Smith's androgynous style, composing the photograph to emphasize contrasts of black and white in Smith's features and wardrobe, in the background, and even in the cat.

Robert Mapplethorpe, Lisa Lyon (1982)

Robert Mapplethorpe met Lisa Lyon at a party in 1979, and he would go on to produce nearly 200 photographs of her over the next several years. The first woman to win the International Federation of Body Builders female competition, Lyon had an androgynous, muscular physique that appealed to Mapplethorpe’s interest in the sculptural body. “I’d never seen anybody that looked like that before,” he said. “Once she took her clothes off it was like seeing something from another planet.” The pinnacle of their collaboration came with the release of the book Lady (1983), a series of portraits of Lyon. In this portrait, Mapplethorpe captures Lyon in her work-out attire, a nod to her role as an early advocate for fitness and weight training, which came to be a defining feature of early and mid-1980s American culture. 

Complementary Exhibition

The LACMA exhibition will also be accompanied by the installation Physical: Sex and the Body in the 1980s, which will feature roughly 30 works from the museum’s permanent collection. Placing Robert Mapplethorpe’s work in dialogue with his contemporaries, the installation examines the cultural and artistic upheavals of a pivotal decade in the history of American art and society. Featured artists include Bruce Weber, Kiki Smith, Sarah Charlesworth, Laura Aguilar, and Marina Abramovic, among others. Physical: Sex and the Body is curated by Ryan Linkof, assistant curator of the Wallis Annenberg Photography department.

Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA, 90036
www.lacma.org

J. Paul Getty Museum
1200 Getty Center Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90049
www.getty.edu

The photograph and Australia, Art Gallery of NSW, Sydney

The photograph and Australia
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
21 March - 8 June 2015 
Queensland Art Gallery
June - September 2015

DAVID MOORE

Migrants arriving in Sydney 1966 

Gelatin silver photograph 

Art Gallery of New South Wales, gift of the artist 1997 

© Lisa, Karen, Michael and Matthew Moore

The photograph and Australia at the Art Gallery of NSW is the largest exhibition of Australian photography held since 1988 that borrows from collections nationwide and looks at the history of the medium.

Reflecting an evolving image of Australia from the 1840s until today, The photograph and Australia presents more than 400 photographs by more than 120 artists, including Morton Allport, Richard Daintree, Paul Foelsche, Samuel Sweet, JJ Dwyer, Charles Bayliss, Frank Hurley, Harold Cazneaux, Olive Cotton, Max Dupain, Sue Ford, Carol Jerrems, Tracey Moffatt, Robyn Stacey, Ricky Maynard, Anne Ferran and Patrick Pound.

The works of renowned artists and those considered to be national icons are shown alongside those by unknown photographers and everyday material, such as domestic albums and postcards. The photographs in this exhibition tell people’s stories, illustrate where and how they lived, and communicate official public narratives. Scientific photography such as the earliest Australian X-rays and astronomical photographs appear alongside contemporary representations of people and place.

Sourced from more than 35 private and public collections across Australia, England and New Zealand, including the National Gallery of Australia, the National Library of Australia and the State Library of Victoria, The photograph and Australia uncovers hidden gems dating from 1845 until now.

From mass media’s evolution in the 19th century to today’s digital revolution, The photograph and Australia investigates how photography has been harnessed to create the idea of a nation and reveals how our view of the world, ourselves and each other has been changed by the advent of photography.

It also explores how photography operates aesthetically, technically, politically and in terms of distribution and proliferation, in the Australian context. Highlights include works by Australia’s first professional photographer, George Goodman and recent works by Simryn Gill.

Curated from a contemporary perspective, the exhibition takes a thematic rather than a chronological approach looking at four interrelated areas: Aboriginal and settler relations; exploration: mining, landscape and stars; portraiture and engagement; collecting and distributing photography.

Exhibition curator, Judy Annear, senior curator, photographs, Art Gallery of NSW, said: ‘We are proud to present The photograph and Australia, an exhibition that considers how the photograph invented modern Australia.

Audiences are invited to experience the richness of Australian photography, past and present, and the sense of wonder the photograph can still induce through its ability to capture both things of the world and the imagination.’

Director Michael Brand stated: ‘We hope that The photograph and Australia will contribute to an understanding of the richness and complexity of the medium and provide impetus for further explorations of the photograph’s production, function and dissemination in this country. We trust that in doing so, it will also help place Australian photography in a broader international context.’

A richly illustrated publication will accompany the exhibition, reflecting the exhibition themes and investigating how Australia itself has been shaped by photography.

There will be related education programs, digital resources, a substantial film program and live events. A major symposium will also be held at the Art Gallery of NSW on 18 April addressing the proliferation and distribution of photographic images.

The photograph and Australia will be open to the public at the Art Gallery of NSW in the major exhibition gallery from 21 March to 8 June 2015, before travelling to the Queensland Art Gallery, where it will be open to the public from June to September 2015.

Art Gallery of NSW - Sydney - Australia
www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au

Taking it all away: MCA Collection, Sydney

Taking it all away: MCA Collection 
Museum of Contemporary Art , Sydney, Australia
Through 22 February 2015

Stuart Ringholt

Untitled (Clock), 2014, clockwork, tubular bells, world globe, steel, glass, electronics 

Museum of Contemporary Art, purchased with funds provided by the MCA Foundation, 2014

Installation view Stuart Ringholt: Kraft, Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne, 2014

Image courtesy the artist and Milani Gallery, Brisbane © the artist, photograph: Andrew Curtis

What might happen if you took away time, so a 24-hour day passed in just 18 hours? What are you left with once 260 volunteers have spent five years erasing a magazine by hand – page by page? These questions about our relationship to time, and how it might be spent and measured, represent one line of enquiry within Taking it all away, an exhibition of works drawn from the Museum of Contemporary Art Collection that is on display this summer.

Taking it all away: MCA Collection presents works that speculate upon the continued importance of Minimalism and conceptual art, the processes of erasure and abstraction, and the social impact of art.

The exhibition includes work by Gordon Bennett, Christian Capurro et. al. (featuring Chris Bond), Peter Cripps, Gail Hastings, Robert Hunter, Rose Nolan and Stuart Ringholt. It presents recent works acquired by the MCA Foundation, along with artworks drawn from the MCA Collection.

Exhibition highlights include Christian Capurro’s erased magazine, which passed through the hands of 250 people over five years and Stuart Ringholt’s 18-hour clock, which explores not only the potential impact of time being taken away but also cosmology and our place within a vast universe. 

In different ways Peter Cripps, Gail Hastings and Robert Hunter explore how art activates our senses of spatiality and temporality, requiring not only our occupation of space but also our input of time and contemplation. Through mirrored surfaces, subtle painted grids or objects to walk around, these works map out the interaction between gallery and spectator.

Gordon Bennett’s soft ground etchings featuring black squares directly reference the origins of abstraction, while Rose Nolan’s banners recall the radical aesthetics of Constructivism’s political slogans. Yet hers are a call to arms of a more individualistic nature, in which party ideology is pared down to personal anxiety.

Natasha Bullock, MCA Senior Curator said ‘If there is a link between the diverse works by the artists featured in Taking it all away it is in their exploration of the dynamics of space and time, set against the complexities of modern life.’

The museum dedicates this exhibition to the memory of artists Gordon Bennett and Robert Hunter, who both sadly passed away during its development.

ARTIST LIST
Gordon Bennett was born 1955, Monto, Queensland. Lived and worked Brisbane. Died Brisbane 2014.
Christian Capurro was born 1968, Dampier, Western Australia. Lives and works Melbourne.
Peter Cripps was born 1948, Melbourne. Lives and works Melbourne.
Gail Hastings was born 1965, Perth. Lives and works Sydney.
Robert Hunter was born 1947, Melbourne. Lived and worked Melbourne. Died Melbourne 2014.
Rose Nolan was born 1959, Melbourne. Lives and works Melbourne.
Stuart Ringholt was born 1971, Perth. Lives and works Melbourne.

Museum of Contemporary Art Australia
www.mca.com.au

Anne Landa Award for video and new media arts 2013, Sydney, Australia

Anne Landa Award for video and new media arts 2013, The space between us

Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney

Through 28 July 2013

THE ANNE LANDA AWARD was the first acquisitive award in Australia to focus on moving image and practices and the application of new technologies to contemporary art. Established in 2004, in honour of Anne Landa, a former trustee of the gallery who embraced challenging art and ideas, the award is a vital platform for presenting and supporting dynamic, exploratory work that is exemplary in this area. The participating artists are eligible for the acquisitive award of $25,000, which sees the winning work enter the Gallery’s collection. Previous winners include: David Rosetzky 2004/5, Monika Tichacek 2006/7, TV Moore 2009, and David Haines and Joyce Hinterding, 2011.

JAMES NEWITT 

Say it like you want it, 2012, production still 

Image courtesy and © the artist

The exhibition The space between us considers the interrelation of video and performance. The fifth in the biennial Anne Landa Award series, this year’s edition is guest-curated by Charlotte Day, Director, Monash University Museum of Art, and features the work of artists Lauren Brincat, Alicia Frankovich, Laresa Kosloff, Angelica Mesiti, Kate Mitchell, James Newitt and Christian Thompson.

The seven artists are connected through their interest in the artist as performing body, the artist as creator/director of performances, and the viewer’s role in relation to the works and as active participant. This resurgence in performative art continues out of a desire to question and test established exhibition and viewing habits, as well as the relative distinctions and distances between artist, artwork and audience, said Charlotte Day.

The exhibition incorporates many live as well as documented performances; visitors may experience tambourine players, women on horseback, groups of people testing their physical endurance and other unexpected encounters in the vicinity of the Gallery.

A digital publication has been produced in association with the exhibition. This publication is available via an app for iPad and include essays, documentation of exhibited works, video, audio and other interactive features.

THE ARTISTS

Sydney-based Lauren Brincat recent work High Horse 2012 is a video recording of an endurance performance in which the artist stood on top of a horse in a pose inspired by a statue of Joan of Arc she saw in Paris. For this exhibition, Brincat will also direct two live performances involving women on horseback riding to the Gallery and 50 people playing tambourines in the Gallery’s entrance court.

Berlin-based Alicia Frankovich appropriates movements and gestures from sport, dance, art history and cinema in her performances, video documentation and sculptural installations. Part of her work in this exhibition is a performance involving a group of joggers, directed by Frankovich in the Gallery’s entrance court.

In her new work, Melbourne-based Laresa Kosloff has filmed viewers in the grand courts at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Kosloff’s project reconsiders who is the subject and what is the object of art and re-establishes the potential for participation and performance in the Gallery.

The four-screen video of Paris-based Angelica Mesiti records diverse performers who in the Western cities they now live in each maintain ties with their birthplace through rhythm, sounds and music. This ambitious video project reflects on deep and powerful memories of the performers and how experience may flow from the inner body into the social space of the community.

Sydney-based Kate Mitchell presents a new work in which she smashes through a series of coloured glass panes, creating a video installation that showcases her interest in performing stunts and pushing herself beyond her comfort zone.

A new video by Lisbon-based James Newitt, made during a residency in Liverpool, UK, shows the evolving dynamic between two opposing groups of volunteers whom he brought together to enact a protest rally.

Oxford-based Christian Thompson employs his father’s Bidjara language, taking the word for the bullroarer, djuldibha, to create an immersive and meditative soundscape of both language and the sound and rhythm of an ancient technology designed to communicate over great distances.

ART GALLERY NSW, SYDNEY

Art gallery's website: www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au