In the Arctic, bacteria endemic to the region colour icebergs a gentle 1950s cocktail pink. In Antarctica a similar phenomenon lends a green tinge to the ice floes, earning them the title of ‘jadebergs’. Before boarding a Russian icebreaker in Arkhangelsk, adventurers admire inquisitive beluga whales and walruses.
When she talks about that initial trip to the Arctic it’s easy to see her awe and the “incredible light.” Except of course, a grim edge tugs at the poles. This northern summer saw sea ice come crashing to new record lows after 30 years of rapid melting.
The artist, always concerned by global issues, “from acid rain during the 1980s with my studio in Paris, and then protesting the cruise missiles at Greenham Common also in the ‘80s” as well as being a feminist, seeing the effects of ice melting first hand greatly moved Anderson. “People are watching the world around them change.”
In Journeys: Due North, the works deal with ideas of extreme travel and expedition work, but it is in the keenly realised sculptural forms which reference the nomadic existence in a world “where weather has begun to lose the cyclic seasons”, which Anderson feels closest to.
“The sculptures touch on stories of migration, of being out of place, of being the ‘arrivist’.” Weaving a folkloric story, deeply connected to the landscape, Due North hinges on Anderson’s multidisciplinary practice. “The work does not represent any particular moment, but rather the videos and sounds bring together an experience.”
Journeys: Due North
Lisa Anderson
Art Gallery of Ballarat
20 August – 2 October
Past meets present in Leyla Steven’s latest exhibition, now showing at the Art Gallery of New South Wales and co-curated by Artspace. The Australian-Balinese artists adopts a collaborative approach to restitution, scrutinising the systems of conservation and documentation we have inherited.
Developed in 2022 by Artback NT as part of Apmere Mparntwe—the Australian Ceramics Triennale— touring exhibition Clay on Country, showing now at New England Regional Art Museum, showcases the diversity of ceramics in the Central Desert.
About Face is a smart piece of marketing. The new book on portrait painting from Australia and New Zealand has a mission to change buyers’ minds about the field. But as Jane O’Sullivan discovers, any sales pitch wears thin if it’s repeated often enough, and the close attention to how portrait painting is received by the market means that other important conversations fade to the background.
Whether beloved pets or superstitious omens, animals have always existed in art. The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia’s latest exhibition is paying tribute to two of the most beloved animal figures: cats and dogs.
In a conversation with Lauren Carroll Harris for her survey exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Julie Rrap discusses 40 years of challenging the male gaze, and the cultural invisibility of the ageing female body.
In GHOSTLAND, her new exhibition at the ANU Art & Design Gallery, Julie Gough continues her lifelong inquiry into gaps and silences—while conjuring the apparitions that haunt Tasmania’s colonial past.
