Posts Tagged ‘National Gallery of Australia’
The NGA’s CEREMONY: An Art Educators workshop at Shepparton Art Museum
SAM / NGA Ceremony Teacher Learning Program
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ABOUT Ceremony + The 4th National Indigenous Art Triennial
From the publication Foreword by Nick Mitzevich, Director – National Gallery of Australia
The National Gallery of Australia is proud to present the fourth iteration of the National Indigenous Art Triennial, titled Ceremony. The exhibition is curated, and this publication edited, by National Gallery Senior Curator-at-large, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Hetti Perkins (Arrernte and Kalkadoon peoples), one of the country’s most celebrated and experienced curators.
Ceremony brings together more than 35 artists from around Australia whose work highlights the primacy of ceremony in their practice and how it connects to community, culture and Country. Featuring newly commissioned works from across the continent, Ceremony represents the diverse practices of First Nations artists in this country, from large-scale installation, performance and video, to ceramics, carving, weaving and photography.
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Ceremony: Teacher Professional Learning Program – An Art Educators workshop at Shepparton Art Museum
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WORKSHOP STRATEGY: The intent of the Teacher Professional Learning Program is to develop capacity for educators in engaging with First Nations visual arts practice using Ceremony, the National Gallery of Australia’s National Indigenous Art Triennial (NIAT) traveling exhibition, as a reference point.
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Anni Jane Linklater, SAM Education Coordinator, opened the event with an Acknowledgement of Country and we were introduced to the NGA teams facilitating the program including members from the curatorial work group, the education representatives and attending artists exhibited in the exhibition.
In the Teacher Professional Learning Program at SAM
With our fellow art educators and other art community representatives the program began with a short lecture session discussing the issues and framework for educational programs and presentations on First Nations art and artists. In this presentation Kelli Cole (NGA First Nations Curator), Aidan Hartshorn (Ceremony Exhibition Curator) and Belinda Briggs (SAM First Nations Curator) discussed the importance of the NIAT to the Australian National Gallery, ‘the significance of commissioning new work, First Nations perspectives and engagement as key National Gallery priority’.
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Kelli Cole discusses Yarrenyty Arltere Artists & Tangentyere Artists, Blak Pariament House (detail), 2021
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In the next part of the program we undertook a floor talk with Kelli Cole and Aidan Hartshorn. Also in this session we were introduced to artist Penny Evans (K/Gamilaroi people), who talked about her work in the show – Burn, 2021. Aidan Hartshorn spoke about his personal connection with his language that was referenced in S.J Norman’s (Wiradjuri people), Bone Library, 2012-2021. The floor talk was both informative and inspirational. We were invited to ask questions and add our thoughts to the interpretation of each of the artworks.
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Some of the discussion topics included were:
- Rather than use of the word “Country” in discussing the artist and their art, which was not advised, instead “Place” was suggested as an alternative term. In using the word “Place” the presenter shows they understand and respect the deep and layered meaning embedded in the word “Country” for First Nations’ culture.
- Research the artist; their story, history and approaches to their art before presenting to give an informed discussion.
- Always use the artists’ words where possible, if not, draw upon the curators’ information.
- Bring creative interactive activities; sensorial and conceptual connections and empathy to the experience of the work for the audience/students.
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Penny Evans, K/Gamilaroi people, discusses her work Burn, 2020-2021
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After morning tea we worked under the guidance of artist Penny Evans in shaping malleable brown clay into small objects to reference the banksia or other forms of nature. Evans created an inclusive, relaxing, meditative space for the participants in their creative work. While working we discussed issues of contemporary education and the importance of using hands in teaching and learning across a variety of subjects beyond art. We were all in agreement that this is a fundamental mode of education to empower students to communicate and work through the development of ideas and knowledge.
Penny Evans in her clay workshop
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After a working lunch in SAM’s Café, Leanne Waterhouse discussed that the NGA were in the process of refining a framework with which First Nations art and cultural issues could be presented. She introduced the provisional draft document entitled The Art Ways of Learning Principles which outlines a values-based approach for best practice and engagement in the National Gallery of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts program and broader learning programs. The principles consist of 5 themes or “pillars” that outline concepts including the values and characteristics of the framework as follows (from the lecture slide):
- Encouraging deep listening and thinking
- Centring First Nations artists voices
- Elevating First Nations arts diversity
- Creating memorable experiences
- Promoting living culture(s) of First Nations people
As educators we were encouraged to consider these Principles and their connection with ‘Indigenous ways of Knowing, Being and Doing’ when we are communicating with others about culture and art.
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Joel Bray, Wiradjuri people, Giraaru Galing Gaanhagirri (the wind will bring rain), 2022 (fragment of video)
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Finally, under the guidance of Noah Watson, NGA First Nations Learning Facilitator and Leanne Waterhouse, we were asked to form two separate groups and prepare a presentation each focussing on a different artwork. One group was given Joel Bray, (Wiradjuri people), Giraaru Galing Gaanhagirri (the wind will bring rain), 2022: an installation of TV screens in which the audience is engaged with the artist’s performance of a dance where his body becomes transparent merging his movement with images of his country.
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Discussing Gutiŋarra Yunupiŋu, Gumatj people, Maralitja, 2021 (constructed image)
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The other group discussed Gutiŋarra Yunupiŋu, (Gumatj people), Maralitja, 2021: an installation of 3 large-scale screens that engaged the audience with a video of waves breaking on the beach from a ground level perspective. During the video there were segments of ceremony and meaning that connected to the artist’s life, his totem, Bäru (the crocodile) and his story in Place.
Through our deep immersion in the Ceremony exhibition through this program we were challenged, inspired, and at times deeply moved by the sharing of knowledge/knowing. This workshop has enhanced both our teaching and learning experience in the engagement with, and discussion of the art of First Nations Peoples. We wish to acknowledge the Shepparton Art Museum for hosting the event and exhibition as well as the National Gallery of Australia for their initiative with the National Indigenous Art Triennial and the opportunity for regional artists and educators to connect with such an informative program.
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Drs Victoria Cooper + Doug Spowart
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4th NIAT – CEREMONY Online Publication
FOR MORE INFORMATION VIEW THE ONLINE PUBLICATION: “CLICK” HERE
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.Images of the workshop and gallery installation ©Doug Spowart 2023
All other copyrights reside with the artists whose works were represented in the Ceremony exhibition
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13 December: James Turrell – Skyspace ‘Within without’
On three occasions we have visited the Turrell Skyspace artwork @ the National Gallery of Australia during our time in Canberra. Turrell states that:
My work is about space and the light that inhabits it. It is about how you confront that space and plumb it with vision. It is about your seeing, like the wordless thought that comes from looking into fire.
For us the Skyspace was like visiting a physical and visual phenomenon. The images that follow record our experience of the artwork – and some of the fun.
An external view of the Skyspace installation
Inside the Skyspace installation – standing before the stupa
Vicky looking up towards the sky opening
4 views of the Skyspace opening
Sitting in the sun spot – two separate views
A wedding photographed in Skyspace
Vicky photographs fellow visitor
Sun circle projection
Inside Turrell’s Skyspace with friends doing selfies
The two of us before the stupa at the end of our visit
A wedding photographed in Skyspace
11 December: Visiting the National Gallery of Australia
Visiting the National Gallery for the first time in 14 months gave an opportunity to see the new Entrance and Foyer as well as, in another post – the James Turrell ‘Within without’ work.
The new extensions add a new box to the front of the building certainly provides an entrance way to the building that adds impact to the visitor’s first encounter with the space. Gone is the revolving door and the feeling of coming in a side entrance. Gallery staff welcome you and direct you to get your tickets for the Renaissance show, or to drop your excess gear at the cloakroom or see arty stuff in the bookshop.
As if to be uplifted to the space where the art is an escalator beckons, when we were there it squeaked disconcertedly, and gradually your anticipation for being drawn into art Nirvana is met by …
THE LIFT LOBBY!! A side-step to the right placed us on track to the exhibition galleries – It is as if the floor plan needed to be shifted 4 metres for the two buildings to line up.
Anyway there were some great shows and art to see and some favourite artworks to re-connect with.
In the PHOTOSPACE Gallery area the exhibition Upstairs downstairs: Photographs of Britain 1874-1990 presented a selection of classic documentary works from familiar names including Julia Margaret Cameron, John Thomson, Cecil Beaton, Felix H. Man, Humphrey Spender, Edith Tudor Hart, Bill Brandt, Grace Robertson, Bert Hardy, David Moore, David Potts, Roger Mayne, Lewis Morley, Chris Killip, Martin Parr and Nick Waplington.
Photography has long served the rich, the famous and the infamous. It has also had many practitioners who have championed the lives of those whose names history has never known. The social documentary tradition, focusing on the lives of ordinary people – usually those powerless to tell their story – has been a driving force in British photography. This is hardly a surprise in a society traditionally marked by class divisions and prejudices. (From the exhibition blurb)
This little gallery space in what was once the bookshop houses the NGA’s photography exhibition presence and while other media ancient and new get large prominent acreage this what we, as the photography interested public, have for the moment as an exhibition space.
Later we visited the big ‘blockbuster’ Renaissance show and, as part of any NGA visit, the Members Lounge to sit and ponder the art seen and experienced over a coffee and friand.
One other new building activity underway at the National Gallery is a bird busily making a nest home in Neil Dawson’s suspended orb sculpture ‘Diamonds’. Interesting …
Neil Dawson’s ‘Diamonds’
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