VAULT EXTRA 8th APRIL 2021
TSCHABALALA SELF: BODILY PLEASURES
Tschabalala Self has invigorated and reimagined the potential of figurative painting, in recent years gaining significant acclaim for her self-described “painting language.” A selection of works by the artist created within the past five years, including two sculptures and three new paintings, are currently on display at the Baltimore Museum of Art. The exhibition titled, ‘By My Self’ traverses the depth, intricacy, and direction of Self’s formal techniques and thinking for investigating the iconographic significance of the Black female form in contemporary culture. Read more about the expanded practice of the artist, as Laura Bannister unpacks Self’s enduring research interests, sites of inspiration and response, as well as the compositional processes of the artist.
‘By My Self’ continues until September 19, 2021.
Click here for the full article published in VAULT Magazine Issue 18 (April – June 2017).
Image credit:Tschabalala Self, Get’It, 2016, acrylic, Flashe, handmade paper and fabric on canvas, 243.8 x 182.8 cm. Courtesy the artist, Thierry Goldberg, New York and Pilar Corrias, London
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BLUE OVER TIME: ROBERT OWEN – A SURVEY
One of Australia’s most eminent artists working within abstraction, Robert Owen, has a major survey at Heide Museum of Modern Art. The exhibition marks the Owen’s larges solo exhibition in Melbourne for more than 20 years, and demonstrates the artist’s diverse interests, styles and mediums, culminating in a meditative and visually stimulating experience.
With a practice that extends from the late-1960s, Owen’s art has engaged a range of mediums and contexts, from painting, sculpture, photography and installation, to public art and architectural commissions. Unifying his far-reaching explorations is his vested interest in geometry and abstraction, as well as pulling inspiration from nature, philosophy and psychology, science and mathematics, music and literature. Curated by Sue Cramer, the survey’s poetic and atmospheric quality speaks to the way the artist grapples with life through art. This is made is clear through the art and the selection of archival material that includes letters and books, as well as through the didactic wall texts that index Owen’s intuitive curiosity towards the forces of the word, both the material and conceptual.
The exhibition continues until May 23, 2021.
Image credit:Installation view Blue Over Time: Robert Owen –A Survey, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne. Photo: Clytie Meredith
THE TJANPI DESERT WEAVERS AT THE NGA
The National Gallery of Australia (NGA) is showing a brilliant new commission by the Tjanpi Desert Weavers. The work is a large-scale installation that tells the ancestral story of the Seven Sisters Dreaming through sculptural forms woven from predominantly natural materials including tjanpi (the Pitjantjatjara word for grass) and raffia.
Works by the The Tjanpi Desert Weavers use native grasses, skillfully knotting and weaving the grasses into contemporary fibre art. As a collective and social enterprise of the NPY Women’s Council, the Tjanpi Desert Weavers brings together artists from 26 remote communities located on Ngaanyatjarra Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (NPY) lands in the Northern Territory, Western Australia and South Australia. They travel vast distances to weave together, and their work is underpinned by a strong connection to Country, culture and community as seen in this spellbinding installation.
The exhibition continues until July 4, 2021.
Image credit:Roma Butler and Yangi Yangi Fox, from Irrunytju in Western Australia, with their sculptures, 2017. Photo: Rhett Hammerton
THE NATIONAL TAKES OVER SYDNEY
Australia’s seminal survey of contemporary Australian art, The National 2021: New Australian Art opens across three of Sydney’s leading arts spaces, together presenting 39 new commissioned projects by Australian artists.
Over the opening weekend in late-March, the spaces hosted a range of events including artist talks, performances and poetry readings. However, if you missed this busy weekend there is still plenty to engage well into 2021. Until September 5, 2021 you will find a distinct installation of works at Carriageworks; and until June 20 works by 13 artists will be installed across the MCA; while the AGNSW will host the work of 17 artists and cultural practitioners until August 22, 2021. The third iteration of The National has been curated by Matt Cox and Erin Vink (AGNSW), Abigail Moncrieff (Carriageworks), and Rachel Kent (MCA), who worked together in close dialogue to develop a three-part exhibition that highlights the multiplicity of ideas and concerns driving contemporaneous Australian artists.
Image credit: Installation view of Deborah Kelly at The National 2021: New Australian Art, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia. Courtesy the MCA and © the artist. Photo: Anna Kučer
