The dearth of criticism

Some artists are often heard to complain about the lack of honest criticism of Aboriginal art. But in such a limited sphere, criticising an Aboriginal artist in formal or aesthetic terms, or at a deeper level, is a bit like shooting fish in a barrel. Too often, critics play the man and not the ball. Can we handle the truth?

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Desert Lake

Curator: Mandy Martin Araluen Arts Centre, Alice Springs 2 March – 14 April 2013

Kieran Finnane

Ghostnets go global, and local

Ghost nets are fishing nets that have been abandoned at sea, lost accidentally, or deliberately discarded. The GhostNet Project, which began on islands and in communities around the top of Australia, uses the nets to make artworks, to raise awareness of marine pollution, to be creative. Awareness of Ghostnets is on the rise both nationally and internationally.

Sue Ryan

Spirits beyond borders: Shadowlife

Curator and Associate Director of Taiwan Culture and Creative Platform Foundation Antoanetta Ivanovna, resident in Taiwan since 2011, discusses the travelling exhibition Shadowlife curated by Djon Mundine and Natalie King, and its impact in Taiwan where consciousness of their indigenous people is not as developed as it is in Australia.

Antoanetta Ivanovna

The archive in the contemporary

The artworks of Danie Mellor, Brian Robinson and Christian Thompson each draw on archival material for subject matter, for inspiration, and to develop new work that harks back and forward at the same time.

Emily Cloney

Disquiet and resistance in the art of Julie Gough

Senior Curator of Indigenous Art at the National Gallery of Victoria Judith Ryan surveys the complex and inventive art practice of Julie Gough who is concerned with "developing a visual language to engage with the unsettling space between conflicting and subsumed Australian histories."

Judith Ryan

Onside

Curator: Toni Bailey Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre 9 February – 24 March 2013

Lucy Ainsworth

Louise Bourgeois: Late Works

Curator: Jason Smith Heide Museum of Modern Art 21 November 2012 – 11 March 2013

Caroline Phillips

Ken Thaiday Senior, Darnley Man

Exhibitions Manager at Cairns Regional Gallery Justin Bishop tells the rich story of how Ken Thaiday Sr. came to be a major Torres Strait Islander artist. In August 2013, Cairns Regional Gallery, in partnership with Cairns Indigenous Art Fair (CIAF), will be presenting a survey exhibition of Ken Thaiday Sr.’s work.

Justin Bishop

Good Medicine

Being Aboriginal doesn’t make you wise, spiritual or even good at art. Being Aboriginal is historical just like being any other nationality or ethnicity. All art can be examined ethnographically, all people can be examined ethnographically.

Stephanie Radok

Tracking Bluey Roberts

Troy-Anthony Baylis

New currency: Ryan Presley

Ryan Presley's 2011 series 'Blood Money' is remarkable. These commemorative banknotes substitute the heroes of the white Australian monoculture (Banjo Patterson, Dame Mary Gilmore, Dame Nellie Melba and Sir Henry Parkes) with Aboriginal heroes, resistance fighters such as Pemulwuy, his son Tjedaberiyn (also known as Tedbury), Dundalli and Jandamarra and others such as the Gurindji stockman Vincent Lingiari who led the Wave Hill walk-off, and the late Wik elder Gladys Tybingoompa.

Daniel Browning

tough(er) love: art from Eyre Peninsula

Curator: John Neylon Flinders University Art Museum 28 February – 28 April 2013

Eleanor Scicchitano

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