9 February to 30 April 2012
There are 7,000 items in Melbourne City Council's Art and Heritage Collection. In this exhibition at the City Gallery, artist and curator Paola Balla puts the principle focus on one of them: William Rowell's painting, An Incident in Sturt's Trip Down The Murray River in 1831.
The painting once hung in the Town Hall, but then languished in the collection store; now it has been returned to Swanston Street – hence the exhibition title. It is a European take on the encounter between 'explorer' Sturt and Aboriginal peoples of the Murray, with some storytelling of her own.
The resulting installation re-positions the painting from a contemporary Koori perspective and includes artefacts, photographs and contemporary artworks, many by urban-based Indigenous artists. The gum leaf emerges as an enduring symbol of cultural strength and exchange.
Curated by Paola Balla
Paola Balla is a Wemba Wemba and Gunditjmara woman, also of Italian and Chinese heritage. Balla is a visual artist, community arts worker, educator, writer and speaker. Her art practice includes drawing, photography, collage, installation and painting; her work satirising colonisation and talking of identity and survival. Inspired by her late grandmother Rosie, Balla’s work draws on personal narrative and ‘black’ humour.
Paola holds a Bachelor of Education-Nyerna Studies from Victoria University, a Post Graduate Diploma and a Masters in Community Cultural Development from the Victorian College of the Arts.
In 2007, Paola was the winner of the VCA’s Besen Family Foundation’s Indigenous Post Graduate Scholarship and the Western Region Premiers Art Award, was short listed in the Victorian Indigenous Art Awards, was the 2009 winner of the Trevor Nickolls Indigenous Student Award and the 2011 Winner of the CAL Three Dimensional Award at the Victorian Indigenous Art Awards.
Paola lectures in Indigenous Studies at Moondani Balluk Indigenous Academic Unit at Victoria University and produces Indigenous community art projects.
Download exhibition catalogue: An Incident in Swanston Street (PDF 593 KB).