A Third Path: the Musée des Confluences

French curator Arnaud Morvan, who recently completed his Phd at the University of Melbourne on the art of the East Kimberley, writes about the new approach to showing and consulting about Indigenous art taken by the still-under construction Musée des Confluences (due to open in 2014) in Lyon.
"It represents a first step towards an abolition of the segregation endured by non-Western art in Europe and an attempt to rise above the antiquated opposition between art and ethnography."

Published June 2011

TextaNudes: Arlene Textaqueen

Sullivan and Strumpf Fine Art, Sydney
3 - 27 March 2011

Published June 2011

Paint every hill: Billy Benn

Billy Benn Perrurle and Catherine Peattie
with essays by Ian McLean and Judith Ryan
IAD Press RRP $34.95

Published June 2011

Ken and Julia Yonetani / Janet Tavener

Still Life: The Food Bowl: Ken and Julia Yonetani
Artereal Gallery, Sydney, June 2011
Mildura Palimpsest #8, 9-11 Sept 2011
GV Art, London, October 2011

Melting moments: Janet Tavener
Incinerator Art Space, Willoughby
2 -27 March 2011

Published June 2011

Branded: The Indigenous Aesthetic

I hate the word brand. People have forgotten the importance of sub-culture. We are a community and an intervention.

Ben Watt, Founder, Buzzin’Fly Records

Published June 2011

Torres Strait Islander watercolours

The Queensland State Library Executive Manager of Indigenous research and projects Tom Mosby writes about the Margaret Lawrie Works on Paper Collection and the role of art in the lives of Torres Strait Islanders. Between July and October 2011, the watercolours in the Margaret Lawrie Works on Paper Collection will, for the first time, be exhibited together as part of 'Strait Home' at the State Library of Queensland.

Published June 2011

Action at Canopy Artspace in Cairns

Canopy Artspace first opened for the 2009 Cairns Art Fair. It houses the Australian Art Print Network, New Flames Foundation and Editions Tremblay NFP (no Fixed Press). Paloma Ramos who works at Editions Tremblay vividly decribes the intense and fertile work in printmaking and sculpture that happens at Canopy.

Published June 2011

Yiwarra Kuju: The Canning Stock Route

Sarah Scott reviews and questions Yiwarra Kuju: The Canning Stock Route exhibition at the National Musuem of Australa. She asks: "Why don’t the NMA’s collections of Indigenous material culture feature more strongly in their exhibition program? Why are both the NMA and the National Gallery of Australia (NGA) collecting the highly sought after and expensive works produced by major Papunya artists? If the commissioning of art and associated documentary material is a priority for the NMA what other Indigenous material culture may they be neglecting?"

Published June 2011

Exhibitions to Watch

Published June 2011

Dis-covery

Long Gallery, Salamanca Arts Centre, Hobart
25 March - 1 May 2011
Curator: Colin Langridge

Published June 2011

Ulli Beier

Ulli Beier (1922-2011)
I remember a Yoruba saying that Ulli often quoted: “If an old man dies, you shall not weep but congratulate his family for that his life has come full circle.”

Published June 2011

Fearing Truganini

Tasmanian essayist and poet, currently working as Indigenous Visiting Research Scholar at AIATSIS in Canberra, Greg Lehman looks over David Hansen's recent award-winning essay entitled 'Seeing Truganini' and finds it wanting.

Published June 2011