Natalya Hughes’ The Interior is a playful exaggeration of Freud’s consultation room. Sculptural seating, richly patterned soft furnishings, uncanny objects d’art, and a hand-painted mural create a stimulating space to unpack our collective and unconscious biases. Audiences are invited to recline and be enveloped, soothed, and held by the furniture’s womanly forms while taking turns playing analyst and patient. Hughes, in her words, explores “society’s unease with women . . . the representation of women, how we are conceptualised, and why expectations of us are so slow to shift.”

Natalya Hughes, Wolves, Watching, 2021–2022, tufted rug (cotton and wool yarn, backing cloths, adhesive), 126 × 155cm. Photograph: Charlie Hillhouse. Courtesy the artist and Institute of Modern Art, Queensland
Institute of Modern Art
30 July to 1 October 2022
Queensland