Moorina Bonini, bawu (body), 2023, video Still
These Arms Hold
Curator: Maya Hodge
Artist(s):
Gabi Briggs| Indiana Hunt|
Moorina Bonini| Tarryn Love.
OPENING JULY 5th 6-8pm
Location: Incinerator Gallery(Main Gallery)
180 Holmes Road, Aberfeldie, 3040
Images: Gianna Rizzo
“Aboriginal women have been at the vanguard of an outlaw culture, which consists of empowering practices that have been created in response to the ongoing denial of the law’s protection.” — Professor Nicole Watson
This exhibition shines a light on how Aboriginal women have always been resistance fighters, from the Frontier Wars to now, whose histories have been erased through colonial violence. The exhibition will traverse contemporary and traditional ways of representing and embodying women’s weaponry and resistance from the south-east of so-called Australia. Through workshops and conversations, artists Gabi Briggs, Indianna Hunt, Moorina Bonini, and Tarryn Love will come together to honour their sovereignty, strength and bloodlines as Aboriginal women through a collaborative installation. These Arms Hold emphasises that Aboriginal women have always fought for their Country, waterways, kin, children, and themselves.
ARTIST BIO’S
Maya Hodge
Maya Hodge is a proud Lardil emerging curator and writer based on the lands of the Kulin Nation (Melbourne). Her practise explores the power of disrupting colonial narratives to uplift First Nations storytelling, healing and artistic autonomy. Hodge is a president artist of this mob’s studio space, based at Collingwood Yards, and a founding member of Ensemble Dutala, Australia’s first Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander chamber ensemble. Her work has been published by Hardie Grant Books, Kill Your Darlings, Craft Victoria and Overland, as well as contributed to projects with Short Black Opera, KINGS Artist-Run, Archie Roach Foundation, YIRRAMBOI Festival, Blindside, West Space, Footscray Community Arts Centre, and La Trobe Art Institute. Last year, she co-curated Collective Movements at Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA) which is now touring across Victoria.
Gabi Briggs
Her work has been exhibited in various shows across Australia and also internationally. Galleries and Institutions include ACMI, The Shed (NY), Sydney Festival, Blak Dot Gallery, Centre for Contemporary Photography and the Koorie Heritage Trust. Moorina has produced and co-curated art and cultural programs across RMIT University, the University of Melbourne and Shepparton Art Museum. Moorina is currently a studio artist and member of Victorian-based Indigenous emerging artist collective thismob.
Gabi Briggs is an Anaiwan woman, a research-based artist, weaver, and community organiser. Her practice reflects a commitment to returning back to Indigenous knowledges and addresses pressing issues like the climate crisis. Gabi engages with the complexities of race, power, and truth-telling through her art, seeking to restore Indigenous sovereignty and enact self-determination. Gabi is the recipient of the 2024 West Space Commission.
Indiana Hunt
Indiana Hunt is a proud Wemba Wemba, Gunditjmara, Jardwadjali, Wergaia woman. She is an emerging visual artist who enjoys exploring different media and connecting people through art. She grew up in Bordertown, SA on Bindjali country and moved to Naarm (Melbourne) in 2016 for study. Indianna studied a Diploma of Visual Arts at RMIT, graduating 2017.
Moorina Bonini
Moorina Bonini is a proud descendant of the Yorta Yorta Dhulunyagen family clan of Ulupna and the Yorta Yorta, Wurundjeri and Wiradjuri Briggs/McCrae family. Moorina is an artist whose works are informed by her experiences as an Aboriginal and Italian woman. Her practice attempts to disrupt and critique the eurocentric foundations that centralise Indigenous categorisation within western institutions. By unsettling the narrative placed upon Aboriginal people as a result of colonisation of Aboriginal Australia, Bonini’s practice is based within Indigenous Knowledge systems and brings this to the fore. Moorina holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from RMIT University and a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) from the Victorian College of the Arts. Moorina is currently a research candidate at Monash University where she is undertaking a PhD within the Wominjeka Djeembana Research Lab.
Tarryn Love
Tarryn Love is a proud Gunditjmara Keerray Woorroong woman, born and raised on Wadawurrung Country. She is a koorroyarr, teenyeen ngapang, tyeentyeeyt ngapangyarr and wanoong ngeerrang - granddaughter, youngest daughter, youngest sister and Aunty. Tarryn is an emerging artist and curator, whose practice exists in the space of creative cultural expression. She creates under the collective of Koorroyarr (granddaughter), honouring her positionality as a Gunditjmara woman. Tarryn’s work represents the distinctiveness of Gunditjmara ways of Knowing, Being and Doing that is not one way but constantly happening and changing. She aims to explore identity in the here and now while centring language and carrying on the work of remembering, reclamation, regeneration, and revitalisation.
This project is in partnership with Incinerator Gallery
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia and Indigenous Languages & Arts Program (ILA).
