Nan Goldin at Heide

Heide's current exhibition Up close: Carol Jerrems with Larry Clark, Nan Goldin and William Yang argues that photography offers a means to engage with and give a picture to "subculture". In this way, the exhibition signposts the political and ethnographic preoccupations of certain photographers of the 1960s-80s.

Aside from the excellent survey of Jerrem's work, the exhibition provides a great opportunity to see Goldin's keystone work The ballad of sexual dependency. Goldin first began showing this slide show with soundtrack to friends - invariably the subject of the photographs - at venues around New York City in the late 1970s. At Heide, it is seen in extended and somewhat updated form. The slide show runs for over an hour and has to be viewed in full. Even if not you're enamoured with Goldin's refusal of technical virtuosity, it's impossible not to be affected by the work's melancholia and intimacy.

Jerrems at MGA and Heide

There are two great opportunities in Melbourne at the moment to consider the significant legacy of one of the city's most important photographers Carol Jerrems (1949-80). A large survey of Jerrems' photographs opened yesterday at Heide Museum of Modern Art. Up close: Carol Jerrems with Larry Clark, Nan Goldin and William Yang draws on a range of public and private collections to build a convincing picture of Jerrems as a great photographer whose work engaged keenly with the politics and style of Melbourne's avant-garde during the 1970s. MGA is showing a series of pictures made recently by Lyndal Walker and Concettina Inserra that draw on the legacy of Jerrems, Taking pictures some time later.

The series presents portraits of Walker and Inserra's milieu, each holding a print of their earlier photograph "Pole Street" (2000), which restages Jerrems' most famous picture "Vale Street" (1975). Also included is a 1976 photograph of Jerrems' friend Juliet holding a print of "Vale Street", itself the point of origin for Walker and Inserra's recent series. We get a clear sense of the influence of Jerrems for later generations of artists. Lyndal and Tina's photographs also suggest that the gender and sexual politics indicated in Jerrems' work, with the hopes it placed in cultural practice as a driver for social reform, remains a work in progress.

Shaune

Bill Henson lectures

Today's Sunday Age has a report on eminent artist Bill Henson's lecture to be delivered tomorrow (Monday 2 August) at BMW Edge, Federation Square. The article suggests this is Bill's first public talk since the controversy over his work two years ago. That's not quite true: Bill spoke at MGA on 29 September last year, when he answered questions from the crowd, some of which touched on the controversy. Bill will again speak to MGA visitors on 12 August.

Shaune

Opening tonight - The Substation

SUB12 series two: opening Friday 30 July 2010 6-8pm.
exhibition dates: 30 July - 22 August 2010

SUB12 is The Substation's major contemporary visual arts program and is a series of three exhibitions featuring the works of some of Melbourne’s newest and brightest visual art makers.

SUB12 runs from 2 July through to 19 September, and is supported by Hobsons Bay City Council.

Officially launched by Cr Bill Tehan, Mayor of Hobsons Bay

Artists in series 2: Bonnie Lane, Brendan Lee, Dead Pan, Tully Moore, Julie Shiels, Kate Daw, Luke Pither

A most powerful transformative experience

Congratulations to Peter Ryan for his win at last night’s CCP 2010 Kodak Salon Awards.

Peter’s work Keeping me from infinitywas considered the ‘Most powerful transformative experience’. Quite the commendation!

For the last four weeks Peter has been running our teen photography workshops in conjunction with Monash Public Library service.

The Salon is on display 30 July – 25 September 2010 so go and check out Peter’s winning work.

Stephanie

Fontaine de Vaucluse

Robyn Stacey's wonderful Fontaine de Vaucluse 2009 from Empire Line series is featured on MGA's 3 x 4.5 metre billboard at the corner of Jells Rd and Ferntree Gully Rd, Wheelers Hill.

Robyn is one of nine artists in Living deadly: haunted surfaces in contemporary art at MGA from 21 July to 19 September 2010. Living deadly will be opened on Saturday 24 July, 3.00pm by Djon Mundine OAM, Indigenous Curator - Contemporary Art, Campbelltown Arts centre. All welcome.

Mark Hislop

Banned books in Australia

The current exhibition at the Baillieu Library at the University of Melbourne (To Deprave and Corrupt: Forbidden, Hidden and Censored Books, 7 June-29 August, 2010) explores "banned books" and censorship in Australia. Associate Professor Robert Nelson (Associate Dean, Art & Design , Monash University) is talking on the Henson & Serrano affairs on Thursday 12 August. Also on the bill is Dr Philip Nitschke and Dr Donald McDonald.
http://www.lib.unimelb.edu.au/collections/special/exhibitions/bannedbooks/

Amanda

Limited places still available!

Our upcoming four-part course An armchair guide to contemporary Aboriginal art with Susan McCulloch & Emily McCulloch Childs kicks off next Thursday and will provide an in-depth and insightful introduction to contemporary Aboriginal art for the beginner, enthusiast and collector.

Get in early and purchase the full series ticket to receive a complimentary copy of the best-selling book McCulloch's Contemporary Aboriginal Art: the complete guide.

Full series subscriptions are just $135 General public/ $115 Friends of MGA
Individual sessions are $35 General/ $30 Friends of MGA

Call MGA 03 8544 0500 to book and head here for session descriptions.

Prepare to be Hijacked!

Regular MGA visitors would recall last year’s exhibition Presentation/Representation: photography from Germany which featured, amongst the other nine contemporary German artists, the work of Heidi Specker.

During Presentation/Representation’s tour to Sydney, Heidi Specker and Theo Deutinger worked together as part of an artist-in-residence project at the Sydney College of the Arts. The resulting body of work ‘Help me I am blind’ is being displayed at RMIT Gallery from 23 July–11 September 2010.

Which is just enough time to whet your appetite for some more German-Australian photographic connections. Coming to MGA at the end of October is Hijacked 2 Australia/Germany. Combining the work of 32 German and Australian photographers the book and exhibition provide an opportunity for cross-cultural conversations.

The Melbourne leg of Hijacked 2 will open at MGA on Sat 30 October 2010 and features a number of MGA Collection artists including Georgia Metaxas, Rebecca Ann Hobbs and Polixeni Papapetrou alongside some photographers whose work would be familiar from past MGA exhibitions both solo and as part of the William & Winifred Bowness Photography Prize: Louis Porter, Bronek Kozka and Michael Corridore.

Image: Heidi SPECKER D'ELSI Eis 1-3 2007, Digital Fine Art Print courtesy of the artist

Anne Zahalka: The way things appear

Winter is a good time for exhibitions throughout Melbourne. It can be easy to miss them though as the cold days and even colder nights tend to keep us locked up in our homes and offices with heaters blasting. And it seems much easier to read about them in the paper or visit their websites instead.

I was glad I ventured into the city on Tuesday night to attend the opening of a new exhibition by one of MGA’s prominent collection artists, Anne Zahalka. Her exhibition, The way things appear, examines the relationship between art, its spaces and its audiences. Stemming from Zahalka’s interest in tourist sites and the way they are seen by tourists, the photographs in this exhibition depict artworks on the walls of international art galleries and viewers interacting with them.

The way things appear is on at Arc One in Flinders Lane until 24 July.

Stella Loftus-Hills

MGA exhibition nominated for Prix Pictet

Paul Dunn’s exhibition Imagined Communities, originally exhibited at MGA in 2009, has been successfully nominated for consideration by the judges of this year’s Prix Pictet.

Sponsored by the Geneva-based private bank Pictet & Cie, the Prix Pictet is the world’s first prize dedicated to photography and sustainability. It has a unique mandate – to use the power of photography to communicate crucial messages to a global audience. The theme of this year’s prize is Growth, which resonates strongly with Dunn’s interest in the ‘growth corridors’ of Australian cities.

Christian Thompson Survey Show

Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi has just slipped this survey show into its program, after something else fell through, but it's an inspired 'filler' - not to be missed!

"Christian Bumbarra Thompson, a Bidjara man of the Kunja Nation, is a photographer, conceptual and performance artist. He is a third wave Indigenous Australian artist whose work and unique experience come from an emersion in the social and cultural zeitgeist of the 80s and 90s as an Aboriginal person. His work is a leading force in the exploration of issues of identity, race and history in Australia. In 2009 Thompson completed a DASARTS residency (Advanced Studies for Performing Arts) in Amsterdam and a residency at The Centre for Future Art Research at Arizona State University, USA. He will be the first Aboriginal person to attend Oxford University after recently being awarded the inaugural Charlie Perkins Scholarship for International post-graduate studies and will undertake a residency at Blast Theory Art Collective in the UK in August 2010. This survey show brings together photographic and video work from the last 10 years of Christian Thompson’s impressive career." (Press release)

-Stephen Zagala