What's On at John Curtin Gallery

Let`s take a final scroll through Nan Goldin: The ballad of sexual dependency ➡️

A gift to her community, made up of everything from artists and musicians, to actors and filmmakers, Goldin`s images were originally shown as slideshows in underground clubs, arranged into themes and performed with a soundtrack. 🪩

This ever-shifting, ever-evolving visual diary of her life would coalesce in time into The ballad of sexual dependency.

In 1985, the slideshow was shown at the Whitney Biennial and the following year the Aperture Foundation published The ballad as a photobook comprised of a selection of 126 images from the 700 or so that made up the slideshow. The National Gallery acquired the last set in the edition in October 2021 from Goldin’s personal collection.

Intensely saturated, glossy, almost impossibly seductive, the prints pulsate as the projected slides had, as if lit within. Goldin doesn’t see very well and perceives the world in hazy blocks of colour. Her use of blurry focus and veils of colour pull us in.
It’s as if the emotion has bled across the surface of the image. 📸

"It’s about trying to feel what another person is feeling. There’s a glass wall between people, and I want to break it." - Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin: The ballad of sexual dependency leaves John Curtin Gallery on Sunday September 14! 😢

🔗 Find out more via the link in our bio.

Nan Goldin: The ballad of sexual dependency is a National Gallery Touring Exhibition presented as part of the Bowness Family Foundation Photography Touring Program.

@nationalgalleryaus @curtinuniversity @curtinlifeaustralia @perthcentreforphotography

#NanGoldin #ArtAcrossAustralia #art #photography #johncurtingallery #curtinuniversity

Leaving this Sunday 14 September! 🤯

There`s less than one week left to see some truly amazing photography from Nan Goldin and James Tylor.

Come and celebrate the end of a successful Makuru season with us, and explore an expansive catalogue of images from Nan Goldin: The ballad of sexual dependency and James Tylor - Turrangka...in the shadows.

If you`ve already seen these exhibitions, let us know what you think down below ... or come and see them again 👀

The gallery will be closed from Monday 15 September to allow for the installation of our upcoming exhibitions on 2 October.

📷 - Ezra Alcantra

#NanGoldin #ArtAcrossAustralia #art #photography #firstnationsart #JamesTylor #Turrangkaintheshadows #johncurtingallery #photoraphy #curtinuniversity

Nan Goldin: The ballad of sexual dependency is a National Gallery Touring Exhibition presented as part of the Bowness Family Foundation Photography Touring Program.

James Tylor – Turrangka...In the shadows is a UNSW Galleries exhibition. This exhibition is made possible through the support of Lotterywest, Lendlease and The Navigators.

@jamesptylor @unswgalleries @nationalgalleryaus @curtinuniversity @curtinlifeaustralia @curtinbfagrads

Post tuition free week blues? 😢

If you`re in need of a pick me up, make sure you keep an eye out for some more of Curtin University`s Public Art Displays!

Here`s some facts on each piece pictured ✨

Janet Laurence`s CLIFF is made up of 159 WA rocks, minerals, gemstones, and crystals. Reaching a height of 18m the piece is designed to engage with all levels of Curtin`s School of Design and the Built Environment building. CLIFF celebrates the great zone of geology that is Western Australia and intersects between art, science, imagination and memory. 🪨

Howard Taylor`s Cyclops emerged from the studies of a nautilus shell. The sculpture`s glass mosaic tiles play with reflected light– as the viewer moves around the object, the changing patterns on the surface of the work mimic the sunlight falling on swaying leaves of the forest. Originally commissioned for ANZ Bank - Head Office in St Georges Tce in 1965, the piece is estimated to weigh seven tonnes!

Found on Level 7 of the T.L. Robertson Library Kelsey Ashe`s Land of a thousand myths is a response to mythologies Kelsey says `intrigue her`. The complicated blend of Indigo, Chlorophyll, Saffron and Henna Botanical inks Screen Printed on Canvas mixed with Photoluminescent Pigment and Wax is finally Mounted on Wood. 😵‍💫

Go even deeper via the link in our bio!

#curtinuniversity #johncurtingallery #publicart

@curtinlifeaustralia @curtinguild @curtin_exchange @explore_curtin

Take a scroll through James Tylor`s - Turrangka...in the shadows ➡️

This beautifully curated wall brings together James` expansive digital photographic series ‘From an Untouched Landscape` and blends them with hand-made contemporary renderings of traditional Kaurna cultural objects.

James` innovative photographic intervention, systematically alters the reading of Country by excising information from the photographic print. 📷

The handcrafted tools and weapons, symbolic of conflict over land, suggest the violence at the root of colonisation and the reason for the false appearance of landscapes as `untouched` before colonisation.

James Tylor - Turrangka ... in the shadows is on display until September 14!

🔗 Find out more via the link in our bio.

#ArtAcrossAustralia #art #photography #firstnationsart #JamesTylor #Turrangkaintheshadows #johncurtingallery #photoraphy #curtinuniversity

James Tylor – Turrangka...In the shadows is a UNSW Galleries exhibition. This exhibition is made possible through the support of Lotterywest, Lendlease and The Navigators.

@jamesptylor @unswgalleries @nationalgalleryaus @curtinuniversity @curtinlifeaustralia @curtinbfa

Huge congratulations to Curtin alumni Grace Yong (@itsgraceyong ) and Mim Kowner (@mimkowner ) for featuring in this year`s @pica_perth Hatched National Graduate Show 2025. 👏

Hatched features Grace Yong`s video piece "her name, an anthology", which earned her the Dr Harold Schenberg Arts Award, as well as Mim Kowner`s paintings from the series ’Magic is sometimes very close to nothing at all’.

Both of these amazing artists will feature in John Curtin Gallery`s alumni exhibition "Everyday, Myths and Legends" coming October 3! 👀

🔗 For more information on our upcoming exhibitions head to the link in our bio.

Images: "her name, an anthology" Grace Yong, "Untitled (red jersey)" Mim Kowner.

@curtinalumni @curtinbfagrads

#curtinuniversity #art #hatched #pica #awardwinning #curtinalumni #johncurtingallery

Attention all fashion fanatics, like the fits above? 👆

Join writer Paul Boyè (@__pb_________) and artist Lillian Colgan (@girl_introjected) at John Curtin Gallery on Wednesday 6 August for Nan Goldin - Clothing Dependence.

This unmissable lunchtime talk will explore how The ballad of sexual dependency offers an archive of moments that provide deeper insights into queer style and taste from a not-too-distant past marked by tragedy and liberation.

All you need to bring is your lunch and curiosity! ✨

🗓️ - Wednesday 6 August 2025
⏰ - 12.30pm - 1.30pm
📍- John Curtin Gallery (Building 200A, Curtin University)
🔗 - Check the link in our bio to register!

Nan Goldin: The ballad of sexual dependency is a National Gallery Touring Exhibition presented as part of the Bowness Family Foundation Photography Touring Program.

@curtinlifeaustralia @curtindbe @nationalgalleryaus @curtinfashion @curtinguild

#NanGoldin #ArtAcrossAustralia #art #photography #fashion #nangoldin

🔎 Artist in focus - Multi-disciplinary artist James Tylor and Curator of Contemporary Art Leigh Robb

James Tylor is a leading Australian artist whose practice examines histories of colonisation and their profound impact on Indigenous cultures.

Tylor uses a hybrid of analogue and digital photographic techniques to create contemporary artworks referencing Australian society and history. James also uses the 19th-century photographic process of the Becquerel Daguerreotype with the aid of technology to create new and contemporary Daguerreotypes.

His methods include the physical manipulation of digital photographic printing, such as manual hand-colouring or physical interventions to the surfaces of images through tearing and scratching. These unique photographic processes re-contextualise the representation of Australian society and history and the medium’s use to document Aboriginal culture and the European colonisation of Australia.

Leigh Robb is Curator of Contemporary Art at the Art Gallery of South Australia. Leigh has curated over fifty exhibitions and has a reputation for working closely with artists to produce ambitious and memorable Australian and international projects.

Turrangka…in the shadows, curated by Leigh, surveys a decade of Tylor`s practice and examines the suppression and erasure of Aboriginal cultural history from the Australian landscape through the ongoing legacy of colonialism.

🔗 To see some of James` work at John Curtin Gallery head to the link in our bio!

📷 - (L-R): Curator of Contemporary Art at the Art Gallery of South Australia Leigh Robb and Multi-disciplinary artist James Tylor, image credit @ezraalcantraphotography.
📷 - Installation view, John Curtin Gallery.

James Tylor – Turrangka...In the shadows is a UNSW Galleries exhibition. This exhibition is made possible through the support of Lotterywest, Lendlease and The Navigators.

@jamesptylor @unswgalleries @curtinbfagrads
#photography #firstnationsart #JamesTylor #Turrangkaintheshadows #johncurtingallery #photoraphy #curtinuniversity