Rama IX Art Museum
  Shadowlife by Vernon Ah Kee, Bindi Cole, Brenda L. Croft, Destiny Deacon/Virginia Fraser, Fiona Foley, Gary Lee, Michael Riley, Christian Thompson and Ivan Sen

Shadow Life Catalogue
 


An exhibition of moving image works by internationally-renowned Indigenous Australian artists. Shadowlife is part of the Australian Embassy’s activities organised in celebration of the 60th Anniversary of Bilateral Relations between Australia and Thailand. Developed by Asialink and the Bendigo Art Gallery, audiences in Thailand will have a chance to see this unique exhibition that will tour in Australia and Asia.
Curated by Djon Mundine OAM and Natalie King, Shadowlife exhibits works by nine internationally renowned contemporary Australian Aboriginal artists (and one non-Indigenous collaborator) engaged in photo-based practices.
Wungguli, an Arnhem Land Djambarrpuyngu word, means ‘spirit’ and ‘shadow’ and came to describe photographic image. Shadowlife explores the notion of the shadow as a representation of our soul. Shadowlife embraces moving image and photography with all its directness, theatricality and immediacy by confronting stereotypes and acting out scenarios.
Exhibition curators Djon Mundine OAM and Natalie King write in the catalogue essay.
“When light shines on something or someone, a shadow is always cast. A person can never desert its shadow and a shadow cannot leave its human original. Every shadow has its own presence and absence. And no more so in this continent, Australia, full of ghosts and shadows honeycombing the historical, social, and physical landscape.”
2012 Exhibitions