Art Guide Australia

Art Guide Australia is a print and online magazine exploring contemporary Australian art. Our editors and our team of writers and contributors know the local art scene and keep you informed through engaging and thoughtful articles. We speak with artists, curators and gallerists to learn more about their ideas and share them with an audience who want to know more about Australian art and what to see. We’re here to support a vibrant and diverse arts community and our aim is to provide independent, considered editorial coverage alongside a comprehensive picture of what’s happening in the visual arts across Australia.

Art Guide Australia

Issue 138 Contributors

A Note From the Editor

Brisbane

Melbourne

Fraser Coast

Benalla

Bunbury

Sydney

Canberra

Adelaide

Canberra

Perth

Still Life • Known for painting startingly minute moments from cinema, Nicola Smith’s newest works draw upon a reference closer to home: childrearing and domestic life.

Into the Blue • The brilliant, blue bark paintings and larrakitj (hollow logs) of Dhambit Munuŋgurr have seen growing acclaim for not only their formal qualities, but how they speak of Country and contemporary politics.

Robert Andrew • In the last decade, Robert Andrew has become known for his works combining technology and ochre, particularly his palimpsest pieces, which over the course of an exhibition reveal a Yawuru or site-specific, local Aboriginal word. It’s a revealing of language, culture and history, exhibiting everywhere from the National Gallery of Australia to the National Gallery of Victoria. Now Andrew is showing at the Museum of Old and New Art (Mona), responding to lutruwita’s (Tasmania’s) buried history and working with local pakana knowledge holders and speakers of palawa kani: the revived language of Tasmanian Aboriginal people. Andrew talks about this collaboration, discovering his Aboriginal heritage, becoming an artist later in life, and the power dynamics of language.

The Big Building Boom • From The Fox: NGV Contemporary to the Sydney Modern Project, to major overhauls of regional art spaces, hundreds of millions of dollars are being funnelled into museum buildings. But are these new buildings being privileged over artists, or is this the future investment we need?

Daniel Boyd

20 Questions with Hayley Millar Baker • Between 2016 and 2019, Gunditjmara artist Hayley Millar Baker created five photographic series in black-and-white. Appropriating and citing images and research from history, alongside digital editing to create layered assemblages, Millar Baker’s images speak to Aboriginal experiences and build a complex conversation on time, memory and identity. These exquisite images are now showing in There we were all in one place. We asked Millar Baker 20 quick questions about the exhibition and her art experiences.

Picture This • The photograph on the right is an incredible snapshot: captured in 1995, from left to right are First Nations artists—and one politician—Brook Andrew, Brenda L Croft, Destiny Deacon, r e a, former New South Wales premier Bob Carr, Richard Bell, Judy Watson and HJ Wedge. It was taken during the Australian opening of a significant, cross-cultural project of Australian First Nations and Black British creatives. Multidisciplinary creative-led researcher Brenda L Croft reflects on this photograph—and what it means today.

After the Floods • After losing her studio in the recent Lismore Floods, Quandamooka artist Megan Cope is having a busy few months, exhibiting everywhere from Melbourne to Shepparton to Paris.

Mysterious Forces • From the Iraq War to natural disasters, since the 1970s acclaimed artist Susan Norrie continues to show us scenes of tragedy and mystery. Now her work is being situated alongside other...