Category: ART

MONA museum in Hobart: Why you need to go right fucking now

MONA Hobart

When it comes to MONA – the Museum of Old and New Art – in Hobart, there’s one thing it has plenty of: stories. Sure, there are the tales of the debaucherous parties that went on in the gallery’s earlier hey-days. The fact it’s privately owned and how and why that came to be. The stories of its political disdain; the owner’s penchant for personal gratification through a gallery hacked into the side of a mountain; it goes on. One thing is for certain, though; there’s only one story that matters, and that’s that it’s a damn good time. There’s nothing but one hell of a cultural awakening that is a far cry from what you’d expect to come out of Hobart, but 8 years prior. MONA is the art gallery that put Hobart on the map, turned up the city’s tourism quota and sits at the pinnacle of wholesome Australian experiences that can only really be found in our southernmost city. The city itself is known – if anything, for its work over the past few years alone – for quality. Quality food, wine, art, experiences, hotels, road trips, scenery, oxygen. Much like the rumours of the existence of MONA, what you can take away from a trip to Tasmania is as wide and varied, but one thing is constant: quality, stories and the whole array of it all. The gallery almost sits atop it all. Though it’s about a 20 minute trip from the centre of town – a journey easily embarked on… Read More

Burger wrappers in the NGV: Celebrate life’s banality with artist Darren Sylvester

Darren Sylvester NGV 2

The dude known for his consumption by consumerism who then turned it into art, Darren Sylvester, has an exhibition on at the National Gallery of Victoria from 1 March to 30 June 2019. From a pulsating coloured dance floor based on an Yves Saint Laurent makeup range, to a chaise lounge upholstered in cheeseburger wrapping, more than 70 of Darren Sylvester’s works – known for their pop culture and multinational brand references – will be on display at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV. The exhibition is called Darren Sylvester: Carve A Future, Devour Everything, Become Something and reveals the artist’s ongoing fascination with consumerism, the banality of everyday life, love and mortality, which he presents in a playful way. On show will be 43 of Sylvester’s hyper-colourful photographs, all an homage and commentary on pop culture, music and advertising as a way of exploring the ways in which everyday life is shaped by branding. Also, a gigantic YSL make up compact lit-up dancefloor interpretation will be one o the stars of the show, thanks to its colour scheme that is ‘proven’ by market research to appear flattering. Darren is a Melbourne man now, having made the move from Sydney in ’74. See his exhibition at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia at Federation Square, Melbourne from 1 March 2019 – 30 June 2019. Entry is free at NGV.MELBOURNE.

Where is Juanita Nielsen? The Sydney exhibition to the local activist

Juanita Nielsen

January will see the Sydney launch of Zanny Begg’s acclaimed installation The Beehive; a video artwork that explores the unsolved murder of Sydney activist Juanita Nielsen. Juanita was a journalist, style-icon, heiress and anti-development campaigner and she fought against the violent eviction of tenants on Victoria Street, Kings Cross. She disappeared on the 4th of July 1975 and now, more than 40 years later, her body has never been found and no one has been charged. This is the first time the installation will be seen in Sydney, and just a few streets from where she was last seen. The exhibition opens 5 January at UNSW Galleries in Paddington for Sydney Festival. What to expect? The work is assembled from a reservoir of scripted fictions, documentary interviews and choreographed sequences. The film is ever-changing, as the footage is randomly selected for each screening with 1,344 possible variations, offering different glimpses and interpretations of this infamous true crime. The artwork presents a kaleidoscopic portrait of Juanita with multiple actors playing the role, including respected theatre actors, Pamela Rabe, who stars in the Australian prison drama Wentworth. Why it’s so good. Beehive was critically acclaimed when unveiled in Melbourne in July. But this is the first time it will be presented in Sydney, just a few blocks from where Juanita was last seen alive. It is an important Sydney story, but it also has relevance to audiences nationally as the work explores gentrification, corruption, sexwork, feminism, housing justice and non-conventional lifestyles. EXHIBITION DETAILS Where: UNSW GalleriesAddress: Cnr. Oxford St and Greens Rd, PaddingtonTel:  02 89360888When: 5 January… Read More

China’s Terracotta Warriors are coming to the National Gallery of Victoria

Terracotta Warriors

This is quite possibly one of the most exciting achievements of the National Gallery of Victoria – NGV – in quite some time. And that’s taking into consideration their constant sessions with world renowned artists and designers as an ongoing thing. Alongside the world of Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang, the Terracotta Warriors of Shaanxi, China will make their way to Melbourne for the second time at the Gallery. “Thirty-six years ago, in 1982, the National Gallery of Victoria presented the first international exhibition of China’s ancient Terracotta Warriors only several years after their discovery. History will be made again in 2019, when the Qin Emperor’s Terracotta Army will return to the NGV for the 2019 Melbourne Winter Masterpieces exhibition series – this time in a sophisticated dialogue with the work one of China’s most celebrated contemporary artists, Cai Guo-Qiang,” said director of the NGV, Tony Ellwood. As part of the Gallery’s 2019 Melbourne Winter Masterpieces presentation: China’s ancient Terracotta Warriors alongside a parallel display of new works by one of the world’s most exciting contemporary artists, Cai Guo-Qiang will make their way to the city of Melbourne in a large scale exhibition from China that is set to outlast the memories of most. The exhibition is aptly named Terracotta Warriors: Guardians of Immortality and is a large-scale presentation of the Qin Emperor’s Terracotta Warriors, which, discovered in 1974 in China’s Shaanxi province, are regarded as one of the greatest archaeological finds of the twentieth century and widely described as the eighth wonder of the world. They’re from c.200 BCE and… Read More

NGV Friday Nights return with late-night summer access to Escher X nendo

NGV Friday

Food, drink and dining are back on at the NGV this summer, into the late hours for the gallery’s loved Friday Nights arrangement. Complete with a music line-up fusing classical and contemporary influences, exclusive late-night access to Escher X nendo / Between Two Worlds, this summer’s headline electronic artists and DJs include songwriter and producer Andy Bull, Melbourne duo Confidence Man, Sydney’s Nicole Millar, record producer Jonti and Australian/Filipino artist Chela are ones to see. Creative collaboration platform anon. will also present Bach X Reimagined, an immersive music installation featuring live classical musicians in the Gallery Kitchen. Head along any Friday from 7 December 2018 – 5 April 2019 + 6 April, 6pm – 10pm. Get tickets here.  

LUMAS Gallery has a new exhibition of photographer Werner Pawlok

House of Maria © Werner Pawlok au.lumas.com

The culture capital has again turned it on at LUMAS Gallery, putting on a show for photography lovers the city/country-wide. The artist? Photographer Werner Pawlok, of course and it’s not stingy on the colour; if that’s your thing. Pawlok first started photographing his idol Jimi Hendrix way back when, and has now established a strong portfolio of profile and celebrities images including John Malkovich, Jean Paul Gaultier, Juliette Binoche and in a good Australian connection, Leigh Bowery. In 1988, Werner contacted Bowery after seeing him in a magazine and Bowery came to Pawlok’s studio for an exclusive shoot and his images have become some of the most synonymous with the performance artist. This exhibition in October at the gallery in Melbourne features a series of works capturing the homes of Havana across the last decade. So, if the reclusive Communist state that almost sparked the end of the world in the Cold War is your thing, then you need to go. The images offer a fascinating glimpse into life in the Cuban capital as it begins to undergo a process of momentous change and reflects on the former glory of its past. The images are stunning, rich blues and greens with old world chandeliers and antique furniture situated alongside to faded photos of revolutionary director Che Guevara. Pawlok has visited Cuba a number of times including for a Chanel fashion show with Harper’s Bazaar and seeks out less accessible places to shoot, literally driving around town for hours until he sees a building he is drawn too and then knocking on strangers doors… Read More

Archibald artist Katherin Longhurst has a new exhibition with a sense of humour

Katherin Longhurst art

Her work is on display in this year’s Archibald at the Art Gallery of NSW, but artist Katherin Longhurst is busy working away at something else; her latest exhibition, Protagonist, on show at Nanda Hobbs gallery in Surry Hills. Kathrin Longhurst is a child of the Cold War. She grew up on the grey side of the Berlin Wall. Her childhood was in a society indoctrinated and controlled with totalitarian vigour through the rule of law and a virulent propaganda machine. The perceived glamour of the west filtered through to the artist as a girl via beaten up glossy magazines and word of mouth stories that one could only dream of. Longhurst’s childhood of counting missiles in school books and experiencing firsthand the results of a society where everything is watched, has left an indelible impression on her. Five decades after the Rosenquist’s  F1-11, Longhurst pointedly pushes at the outer edges of the ideological boundaries in our world. Protagonist is an exhibition that delivers its message in a playful way, yet, ideologically nuclear in its motherload of social commentary.  It is an exhibition that speaks to a world that struggles with identity—not only from the nationalist point of view—but with male/female ideology.  Yet, like all great artists, Longhurst can keep a sense of humour, albeit laced with the irony and lessons from history. Protagonist opens at Nanda\Hobbs on Thursday 14 June, 6-8pm. The exhibition runs to 30 June, 2018.

MoMA comes to the NGV this winter: 130 years of modern and contemporary art

NGV gallery

The NGV is throwing it back this winter with 130 years of modern and contemporary art at their latest, major exhibition. Straight from the New York iconic museum that is the Museum of Modern Art, or MoMA, the new exhibition opens on 9 June at NGV International in Melbourne. Co-organised by the NGV and MoMA, the exhibition features more than 200 works – many of which have never been seen in Australia – from a line-up of seminal nineteenth and twentieth-century artists, including Vincent van Gogh, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Marcel Duchamp, Salvador Dali?, Frida Kahlo, Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper, Louise Bourgeois, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Diane Arbus, Agnes Martin and Andy Warhol. Bringing the exhibition up to the present are works by many significant twenty-first century artists including Jeff Koons, Cindy Sherman, Olafur Eliasson, Andreas Gursky, El Anatsui, Rineke Dijkstra, Kara Walker, Mona Hatoum and Camille Henrot. Basically, there’s a lot. It will be the largest instalment of the Melbourne Winter Masterpieces exhibition series to date, for the first time encompassing the entire ground floor of NGV International. MoMA at NGV will explore the emergence and development of major art movements, and represent more than 130 years of radical artistic innovation. The exhibition will also reflect the wider technological, social and political developments that transformed society during this period, from late nineteenth century urban and industrial transformation, through to the digital and global present. Head to the NGV website ad sort out your tickets here.