Dive in and Explore Must-See Art
A guide to our Visual Arts exhibitions!
Did you think the Festival fun had wrapped up for the year? Fear not!
Our incredible Visual Arts program is still running across different Perth venues, and they’re a free experience anyone can enjoy. Whether your art interest is piqued with incredible mixed-media, immersive installations or more traditional paintings, these remaining exhibits will keep your imagination running long after you’ve left the venue.
Check out our handy guide to the remaining exhibitions from this years' program. Get out and see them before they close!
Image: Isaac Julien, 'Green Screen Goddess' (Ten Thousand Waves), 2010, Endura Ultra photograph Images courtesy the artist and Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery
Isaac Julien
Until Sun 8 May
Acclaimed British film maker and installation artist Isaac Julien is widely recognised for exquisitely crafted film works and photographs, underpinned by a penetrating interrogation of the universal human concerns for social justice, equity and freedom.
His multi-screen film installations and photographs create a poetic and unique visual language.
Excitedly, this is the first time his works Ten Thousand Waves and Lessons of the Hour are being shown outside Europe and the USA!
Head to John Curtin Gallery at the Curtin University campus to explore the work.
Image: Luisa Hansel, 'Leafworm', 2021. Courtesy the artist and sweat pea, Perth.
Ariel’s Song
Until Sat 23 Apr
Ariel’s Song is an exhibition about shipwrecked feelings, rich and strange transformations, and magical thinking.
The art places contemporary artists Luisa Hansal, Jess Tan and Wade Taylor in conversation with surreal and stormy visions from the UWA Art Collection.
This exhibition borrows its title from both a famous passage from Shakespeare’s The Tempest and a survey of Western Australian landscape painter Audrey Greenhalgh, whose paintings and drawings of the ocean searched for ‘the energy, vitality and movement beneath the surface’ of the tangible world.
Head to Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery at the UWA campus to explore the work.
Image: Amrita Hepi, 'Monumental', 2020, HD video (still), 16:9, colour, sound. Courtesy the artist and Anna Schwartz Gallery
Monumental
Until Sun 24 Apr
Monumental appeals to the grand sensation of the sun setting over the ocean and the new day that rises in its place, imbued with the faint hope of possibility and renewal.
This is stunning work created by Bunjalung/Ngāpuhi artist and choreographer Amrita Hepi.
In the wake of BLM protests and renewed calls for the removal of inherited monuments that symbolise the impact of colonialism and its ongoing legacies, Monumental is a charged meditation on the tradition of building monuments, questioning who and what gets memorialised.
Head to PICA in Northbridge to explore the work.
Image: Sonia Kurarra, 'Martuwarra', 2021, synthetic polymer paint on canvas Courtesy the artist and Mangkaja Arts Resource Agency
Portals of Love and Loss
Until Sat 23 Apr
Senior Walmajarri artist, Sonia Kurarra, has been making work prolifically since the mid-1990s and is recognised as one of WA’s most successful living artists. Portals of Love and Loss is a landmark solo exhibition of her work.
Painting the sandy billabong country along stretches of the Martuwarra (Fitzroy River), Sonia’s work reflects an intimate relationship with the river and its surrounding environment.
The exhibition speaks to the significance of the Country surrounding the Fitzroy River at a time when it is increasingly threatened by external interests.
It poses a question – how would you read Sonia Kurarra’s work if billabongs ceased to exist in the Kimberley?
Head to Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery at the UWA campus to explore the work.
Gallery goers experiencing Katie West's exhibition 'We Hold You Close' at PICA. Image cr. Sophie Minissale.
We Hold You Close
Until Sun 24 Apr
Drawing together textiles, sound, video and community practice, York-based Yindjibarndi artist Katie West has teamed up with Perth-born Rotterdam-based curator Eloise Sweetman to present We Hold You Close her most ambitious project to date.
Central to the exhibition is a meeting space in which the visitors can make hand-twisted string from repurposed fabric.
Throughout the course of the exhibition, visitors add their handiwork to the gallery walls, creating an ever-expanding supportive structure.
Head to PICA in Northbridge to explore the work.
Image: Sonja Carmichael & Elisa Jane Carmichael, 'Balgagu gara (come celebrate)', 2020, cyanotype on cotton. Photo: Grant Hancock Courtesy the artists, Onespace Gallery and the Art Gallery of South Australia
Undertow
Until Mon 25 Apr
Undertow brings together artists working in a range of modes and materials, from large format cyanotype, to glass neon, site-specific intervention, photography, sculpture, installation and film to celebrate the many ways artists explore and document our worlds. The work reflects upon history and reality, and in doing so offering us new ways to consider and connect narratives and experiences.
The artists interrogate issues which impact all our lives - from persecution, migration, nationalism, systemic racism, custodianship of Country and the continued threats of climate change and sea level rise.
A fantastic exhibition not to be missed.
Head to the Fremantle Arts Centre to explore the work.
Image: Fayen d’Evie with Anna Seymour, Vincent Chan & Trent Walter, Essays in gestural poetics {;;} “Care is a cognate to grief” (detail), 2021, screenprint and tactual UV prints
Our Language
Until 9 Apr
Language is both a means of communication and a carrier of culture. When learning a language, we learn much more than words.
Besides being verbal, language can be made up of symbols, non-verbal sounds and actions.
The artists in Our Language navigate between languages with empathy and creativity exploring what language can tell us about ourselves and our environment. Featuring video, soft sculpture, zines, and print works, artists Alter Boy, Fayen d’Evie, Nastaran Ghadiri, Zou Mat Je, and Josh Ophel navigate between languages with empathy and creativity, exploring what language can tell us about the world and our place in it.
Head to DADAA in Fremantle to explore the work
Header image cr. Ilkka K Photography