20 August – 15 October 2022

16albermarle Undertaking Area
16 Albermarle Road
Newtown NSW 2042
Thu – Sat, 11am – 5pm
or by appointment

Presenting the works of seventeen artists—sixteen girls and one non-binary individual—from a non-public assortment of southeast Asian artwork, Our Grandfather Highway presents a possibility for Australian audiences to have interaction with among the most socially-engaged and topical artwork produced by up to date artists each rising and established from the area. On the identical time, the exhibition represents an vital lateral connection between Australia and the international locations in her quick proximity. It’s directly a method for underrepresented girls and non-binary artists in Southeast Asia to search out avenues for inventive expression or political commentary outdoors their native international locations, and an opportunity for Australians to have interaction with a plurality of pressing views located outdoors, however not removed from, the borders of the nation.

Arahmaiani Feisal (b 1961)

Bussaraporn Thongchai (b 1985)

Citra Sasmita (b 1990)

Emily Phyo (b 1982 )

Fitriani Dwi Kurniasih (b 1981)

I Gusti Ayu Kadek Murniasih (1966-2006)

Ipehnur Beresyit (b 1993)

Kasarin Himacharoen (b 1989)

MM Yu (b 1978)

Maharani Mancanagara (b 1990)

Maria Indriasari (b 1976)

Olga Rindang Amesti (b 1994)

Restu Ratnaningtyas (b 1981)

Sam Lo (twenty first Century)

Sekarputri Sidhiawati (b 1986)

Soe Yu Nwe (b 1989)

Wawi Navarroza (b 1979)

Resistive to one-dimensional readings or an impulse to classify, the varied array of inventive practices represented within the exhibition every take a look at the very definitions of gender and place which seem to bind them collectively.
Collectively, they communicate to a fluidity in identification and expertise. Multifaceted, mutable and at all times inflected by temporal and spatial specificities, the works problem assumptions of a common female expertise, or of Southeast Asia as a cohesive and glued regional entity.

But, it’s from this polyphony of voices that we glean shared issues and connections.
Slightly than a monolithic narrative of womanhood, nationhood, or regionalism, the artworks in Our Grandfather Highway are threaded collectively by an emphasis on the physique and its setting. They type persistent reminders of the immediacy of a lived, contextually-sited actuality, because it wears itself on the physique, typically subtly, typically violently.

Every artist shows a way of self that’s at all times marked by and attentive to its environment—in Wawi Navarozza’s (Philippines) intimate photographic self-portrait, and MM Yu’s (Philippines) immersive photographs of quickly urbanising Manila; and within the co-mingling of vulnerability, magnificence, and the grotesque in Soe Yu Nwe’s (Myanmar) glittering ceramic snake, and Bussaraporn Thongchai’s (Thailand) gown of human mammae rendered in gradations of charcoal.

Gathered in an intimate, shared area, the works lengthen an invite to watch, pay attention, and understand by way of the artists’ eyes and our bodies new potential methods ahead—of voicing and staging resistance within the hopes of leaving an imprint.

CURATOR:
Jennifer Yang accomplished a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) majoring in Artwork Historical past on the College of Sydney in 2022. Her analysis centres on East and Southeast Asian trendy and up to date artwork, and she or he was
awarded the College Medal for her dissertation on the up to date Chinese language-Indonesian artist Tintin Wulia. Jennifer has beforehand interned with Jakarta-based Museum MACAN’s curatorial and collections division  in 2019-20, labored collaboratively with the Artwork Gallery of New South Wales’ public applications crew for the 2021 ArtExpress Exhibition, and has been awarded for her speech responding to Samoan-Australian artist Angela Tiatia’s work. Her latest work contains an essay on up to date Southeast Asian images, printed by the College of Colombia’s Undergraduate Journal of Artwork Historical past, and an article on the “forgotten” Chinese language-Indonesian painter Chiang Yu Tie written with the help of the Sydney Southeast Asian Centre and printed by New Mandala.