From 11 February to 6 March, Perth Festival will present an exciting program of music, performance, literature, theatre, film, and eats, across the City of Perth. Alternate realities, dreams, speculative futures, mythical abstractions, and submerged histories are set to immerse viewers in the depths and wonder of Wardan (Ocean), presented by leading contemporary artists working across various fields of creative practice and mediums.
Amrita Hepi, Monumental, 2020, HD video (still), 16:9, colour, sound. Courtesy the artist, Anna Schwartz Gallery, Melbourne and Perth Festival, Western Australia
Exhibitions and art activations include a video installation titled Monumental, 2020, at Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, which presents a dramatic choreographed performance by Bundjulung/Ngāpuhi artist Amrita Hepi with six other dancers who topple a single monument of a looming colonial figure, then, mounting the plinth and using only their bodies as medium, the dancers build a new monument and raise the question of ‘who and what should be memorialised?’. At the Alex Hotel & Shadow Wine Bar, artists Tarryn Gill and Benjamin Barretto’s The Sunset Lounge invites audiences to experience a magical dreamscape where otherworldly creatures and captivating soundscapes mingle.
Sonia Kurarra, Martuwarra, 2021, synthetic polymer paint on canvas. Courtesy the artist and Mangkaja Arts Resource Agency
Portals of Love and Loss at Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery features newly commissioned work alongside key pieces and recent experiments with leather, paper and Perspex by one of Western Australia’s most successful living First Nations artists, Senior Walmajarri artist, Sonia Kurarra. The exhibition speaks to the significance of the Country surrounding the Fitzroy River at a time when it is increasingly threatened by external interests.
At Fremantle Arts Centre, Undertow looks at the complexities of our interactions with the ocean, and the Art Gallery of Western Australia invites children and adults alike to celebrate First Nations arts, culture and community with workshops, dance, and storytelling, during The Ever Present Family Day on Saturday, 26 February. Historical retellings and cross-cultural stories are reimagined in two multi-channel video works by renowned British filmmaker and installation artist Isaac Julien at John Curtin Gallery. Explore the full calendar of free and ticketed events online.
