Exhibitions

Past exhibition program

Art & Land: Contemporary Australian Visions

Art & Land: Contemporary Australian Visions is a visual arts touring exhibition curated by Kevin Wilson, Director of Noosa Regional Gallery in Queensland. The exhibition explores contemporary views of the landscape in painting, drawing, sculpture and sound by 20 Australian artists:

Australia is famous for its natural resources and spectacular scenery and is almost as famous for its artistic interpretation of these. Aboriginal depiction of the landscape has existed since long before recorded history and European landscape painting began before settlement. In many ways the genre of 'Landscape' has become a cliché, so common is its expression, however Kevin Wilson, and the artists he has brought together to form Art & Land, have provided a fresh vision of our country. He says that:   'Art & Land is not an exhibition about heroic images of landscape but rather an exploration of a wide array of cultural issues such as history, politics, science, aesthetics and spirituality around the idea of 'the land".'

Mary Napangardi Gallagher, Untitled, 1987, acrylic on linen, 122 x 92cm

Ingo Kleinert, Midden 1 1996, weathered wood, nails, 54 x 54 x 13 cm

'My work comes from and is about the land, country and place. It is about time and change and our relationship and position within those elements. In my work I aim to convey through structure, form and material, our dependence on both our natural and urban environment. The material, be it corrugated iron or weathered wood, is central to the meaning and aesthetic of my work.' Ingo Kleinert

The exhibition toured to three venues in Thailand- the Chiang Mai Contemporary Art Gallery, Chiang Mai University; the Art Gallery of the Faculty of Painting, Sculpture and Graphic Arts, Silpakorn University, Bangkok; and the Art and Culture Museum, Khon Kaen University. It then travelled to the Lao Cultural Hall in Vientiane, the first Asialink exhibition ever to tour to Laos. Its final overseas destination was the premier art gallery of The Philippines, the Metropolitan Museum of Manila.
The exhibition continues to tour to 10 venues across Australia in 2001.

A priority of this project was to raise the expertise and provide opportunities to regional arts personnel whose organizations would not necessarily be able to support them for overseas travel. Myer Foundation funding was awarded directly to Noosa Regional Gallery to invite curators from similar galleries and to develop substantial links with Asian countries, their galleries and artists.

Kevin Wilson of Noosa Regional Gallery, John Walsh, Gallery Manager of Gold Coast City Art Gallery and Jacquelyn Murphy, Community Arts Officer, Brisbane City Council, all took up the opportunity to travel with Art & Land and brought considerable skills to the display and interpretation of the exhibition. Two of the artists in the exhibition, Kevin Todd and Heather Winter, also toured with the exhibition to Khon Kaen and Manila respectively. Both received funding from their teaching institutions to enable them to do some strategic work for their organizations in conjunction with their exhibition responsibilities.

Heather Winter (exhibiting artist) opens Art & Land at the Art and Culture Museum, Khon Kaen University

Art & Land was able promote the work of contemporary Australian artists and through this, a diverse range of philosophical, cultural and political issues held by the contributors. The issues contained within the core of the works provoked discussion and prompted new writing.

As a touring exhibition travelling to multiple venues, Art & Land also provided a vehicle to foster relationships between many people, including those who were directly connected with the exhibition as well as those who shared similar experiences

Fiona Foley, Spiral Presence, Coloured Sand, 1997, wooden boxes, glass bottles, sand, paint on canvas