Feature Desert Mob First held in 1990 at Araluen Arts Centre in Alice Springs, Desert Mob is the oldest of Australia’s thriving annual program of Aboriginal art fairs. With its 30th anniversary coming up in September 2020, Kate Hennessy looks back on Desert Mob 2019. Kate Hennessy
Preview Bhenji Ra dreams in dance In Biraddali Dancing on the Horizon, now showing at Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA), Australian-Filipina artist Bhenji Ra explores pangalay—a dance form indigenous to the Tausug and Bajau peoples from the Sulu Archipelago and Sabah in the Philippines. Josephine Mead
Feature Taking flight with Sorawit Songsataya Shaped by the movement between histories and cultures, the work of Thai-born, Aotearoa-raised artist Sorawit Songsataya draws on mystery and plurality as a means of knowing the world. The artist is now showing at Australian Centre for Contemporary Art and Monash University Museum of Art. Amelia Winata
Preview Abstracting time From Mark Rothko and Agnes Martin to Lindy Lee and Paul Knight, an exhibition at Ipswich Art Gallery uses the expanded field of abstraction to encourage deliberate and slow looking. Sally Gearon
Interview Sustaining culture with Gillian Kayrooz To coincide with the presentation of the 3rd Bankstown Biennale: Same Same/Different, Gillian Kayrooz spoke to Karina Dias Pires about how food can express the complexities of culture and difference—and spark unlikely connections across time and place. Karina Dias Pires
Feature Marikit Santiago’s divine interventions In her audacious new exhibition, the Filipina Australian artist Marikit Santiago skewers the myths of the western canon and give pleasure and power—as experienced by women of colour—an arresting new form. Steve Dow