Delicately hand-embroidered still lives by Regi Cherini, which subvert the domestic medium of embroidery and flip the passage of ‘growing up’ to the thrill of the contemporary needlecraft movement. Nostalgic treats from the 1980s and 90’s are lovingly replicated in self-indulgent stich. Regi Cherini is the pseudonym of arts worker Geraldine Henrici.
Planetary Gestures
Planetary Gestures is an exhibition devised to explore ideas surrounding ecological systems, ancient knowledge, celestial blueprints and tidal movements across the land, sea and sky known as Australasia, part of the wider Asia-Pacific and the ‘Great Ocean’. This framework brings together a range of artists who think deeply about alternative geographies; paying respect to the cultural continuum and envisioning a future, not only equipped with this knowledge but also actively enacting it.
In her 2003 text, Death of a Discipline, theorist Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak put forward the proposition, “can we imagine ourselves as planetary subjects rather than global agents, planetary creatures rather than global entities?” Taking this perspective as a starting point, Planetary Gestures aims to open spaces of respect and responsibility for the unique differences and otherness of planetary subjects, human and nonhuman, a particularly relevant and urgent cause to explore in our post-pandemic context today.
Cycles of movement and time will be explored by local and international artists in a group exhibition and publication including Amrita Hepi, Susie Losch, Raqs Media Collective, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Jimmy John Thaiday and Trevor Yeung.
Together, these artists direct us towards where the sea meets the sun; and dare us to imagine a future deeply respectful for the multiplicity of perspectives derived from the many custodians of the planet.
Curated by Tess Maunder for NorthSite Contemporary Arts
e VULVA lution
Enter the fleshly site-specific, multi-sensory installation by Cairns-based, Canadian-born artist India Collins.
“As the materials I use in my weaves sat against skin, they inevitably harnessed energy and still hold embodied memory and meaning.
Previously these clothes may have enabled us to be seen as we chose, they may have contributed to our individual style and identity, or told of our social status. They may have marked milestones or major days in our lives.
These materials may have once kept us protected, they may have sexualized us, they may have empowered us, spoken for us when we had no words,
or assisted us to go unnoticed through our days, allowing us to either fit in or stand out in society.
Ultimately each clothing item I incorporate into an art piece, retains the intimate memories of women’s experiences within its fibres.
I hope this project and installation shines a spotlight on the multiplicity of women’s stories, our plurality and commonality, the cause & effect of positionality and how bias, assumption and opinion inevitably lead to stigma.”
How you can contribute
With confidentiality ensured, female-identifying audience members are invited to contribute an item of pre-loved clothing along with a story of personal significance.
I would like to offer the opportunity to submit an intimate account, share a secret, purge a memory that no longer serves you or perhaps extend on a story or experience that empowers you.
Over the next year I will weave new works with your items, wrapping together the individual and collective narratives that you share, hearing and reading your stories that are intrinsically connected to the experiences had while wearing these clothes.
This new sculpture will honour your contributions and intimate storytelling; ultimately celebrating the process of transference and renewal whilst paying homage to local women’s vulnerabilities and victories.”
Please make contributions within the gallery exhibition.
This project, ‘e VULVA lution’, developed in partnership with NorthSite Contemporary Arts and Situate Art in Festivals and is part of a two-year research and development process that will grow in scale and scope, to present the next multi-sensory installation ‘re VULVA lution’ beyond the cocoon of the gallery within the public sphere in 2024. This social practice extension will weave and reflect the contributions of women’s textile objects and life experiences contributed to the artist during their experience within ‘e VULVA lution’.
This project is supported by the Regional Arts Development Fund; a partnership between the Queensland Government and Cairns Regional Council to support local arts and culture in regional Queensland. NorthSite is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body. NorthSite is supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.
Gab Titui | Bulmba-ja Facade
Vibrant marine life stories of Zenadh Kes (Torres Strait Islands) abound through the Gab Titui Cultural Centre offering on the Bulmba-ja art centre digital façade.
Featuring artworks from Moana Ahwang, George Gabey, Laura De Jersey, and Jimmy K Thaiday, seafaring scenes portray crayfish freediving in bommies and dugong feeding trails in the shallows, with Spanish mackerel game fish, mating turtles, and birds in flight.
The shape of dugongs in the dhari (headdress) symbolically align with the swimming shark illustrating cultural connection. Depicting ancestorial totems and patterning through painting and linocut techniques relates deep knowledge and listening to the endemic wildlife that traverses and calls the region home.
The Bulmba-ja facade project is supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.
Pressing Topics
Using the iron, as the iconic symbol of domestic labour, Pressing Topics addresses issues related to the gendered and racialized oppression of our world’s domestic work force, the women.
This multi-media installation of projection, sculpture, digital collage, video and sound is a low fi wonderland that smashes pink, Pop and the industrial into a new and playful aesthetic. This work attempts to disrupt the ideal proposition of the perfect house wife or the perfect domestic worker and aims to elevate and confront historical and ongoing contemporary issues of discrimination in the domestic labour force.
This work operates through a glitch feminist lens. This natural progression from Cyberfemisim, Glitch feminism, uses the notion of the digital error to interrupt existing social structures including the patriarchy and capitalism to imagine new worlds.
Pressing Topics addresses contemporary issues of gender socialisation and equity within the trans global workforce. The Ironing Maidens reorder the hierarchy associated with familiar domestic objects like iron boards, washing machines and ovens into a powerful instrument of criticality. This installation of absurd digital montages, audio hacks, multiples and repetition makes the familiar strange as an offering to reassess and emphasise the unseen labour of women.
The Regional Arts Development Fund is a partnership between the Queensland Government and Cairns Regional Council to support local arts and culture in regional Queensland.
NorthSite Art Market | Christmas Cubes
The NorthSite Art Market is back, showcasing a range of unique, handmade and affordable gifts created by Queensland-based artists and designers.Wrap up your Christmas shopping straight from the gallery wall at NorthSite this season.
NorthSite Art Market: Christmas Cubes is showing from 21 November 2022 to 28 January 2023.
Oceans Five
This group exhibition from the 2022 TAFE Queensland visual arts graduating students, showcases a major body of new works from each emerging artist.
Focusing on the concepts and diverse techniques developed through their course that inform each artist’s creative practice into the future.
Meanwhile
Meanwhile pays homage to the collective creative experience. Presenting the works of Australian artist group, Sixfold Project, the exhibition embraces simultaneous art production across disparate geographic locations, time zones and emotional conditions.
Meanwhile features new work from artists, Jennifer Valmadre, Rose Rigley, Julie Poulsen, Louisa Ennis-Thomas, Barbara Dover and Raewyn Biggs, probing and challenging their individual interpretations of time and place within personal philosophical frameworks. At times, shared. At times, unique.
Sixfold Project confronts their innermost maker: digging into the depths of their studios to reveal the debris of their art-making process, the brave ideas which can’t be contained, their material contemplations, and fresh responses to a world which is constantly shifting and evolving.
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The Regional Arts Development Fund is a partnership between the Queensland Government and Cairns Regional Council to support local arts and culture in regional Queensland.
Mornington Island | Bulmba-ja Facade
Artworks from the recent Legacies Living On exhibition, by the artists of the Mirndiyan Gununa – Mornington Island Art Centre, have been translated into magnificent public artwork, visible day and night on the Bulmba-ja facade.
This extensive body of work from twelve contemporary Lardil and Kaiadilt artists articulates the intertwined dreaming and storylines of both groups now based at Mirndiyan Gununa (Mornington Island), paying homage to the leading modern artists from their respective clans.
Digital technician Russell Milledge worked closely with Mirndiyan Gununa Aboriginal Corporation to translate these significant artworks into the site-specific large-scale public artworks on the main street building facade.
It has been wonderful to see this spectacular exhibition adapted in new ways to reach more people through public art. These paintings are now off to Brisbane for a very special exhibition… stay tuned!
A special congratulations to the artists: Amy Loogatha, Elsie Gabori, Dolly Loogatha, Ethel Thomas, Dorothy Gabori, Agnes Kohler, Joelene Roughsey, Amanda Gabori, Betty Williams, Roxanne Thomas, Renee Wilson and John Williams.
The Bulmba-ja facade project is supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.
MOA Arts | Bulmba-ja Facade
The Bulmba-ja LED facade is featuring artworks by four artists from Moa Arts, Ngalmun Lagau Minaral: David Bosun, Fiona Elisala-Mosby, Paula Savage and Solomon Booth.
Moa Arts is located in the Kubin Community on the south side of Mua Island. The artists’ works capture stories from their Mualgal ancestors, totemic representation and their connection to sea, land, sky and family.
Digital technician Russell Milledge worked closely with Moa Arts to translate these artworks into the site-specific large-scale public artworks on the Bulmba-ja LED facade, Cairns CBD.
Come and experience these wonderful artworks on the Bulmba-ja LED facade: 96 Abbott Street, Cairns City 4870