SUBVERTING ‘THE INTOLERABLE IMAGE’ (2019)
Subverting ‘The Intolerable Narrative’ is an exhibition that explores the multiple ways that beauty and ‘gentle aesthetics’(1) can be employed to address traumatic events or ‘intolerable narratives’ that are embedded within familial histories. The exhibition is a curatorial project between Australian writer and curator Nikita Holcombe in collaboration with Taiwanese Australian artist Stella Chen, Kamilaroi/Gamillaraay artist Dennis Golding Weatherall, Southern Arrernte, Kaytetye and Ammatyerre nations artist Carmen Glynn-Braun, Cambodian Australian artist Linda Sok and Biri artist Kirra Weingarth.
The selected artworks stem from the artist’s position within Australia and their individual exploration the intergenerational effects of trauma through the lens of their indigenous and migrant perspectives. The artists will actively engage with each other’s narratives to present confronting histories and traumatic events through a range of varied aesthetic strategies.
The exhibition will showcase and interweave the strategies employed to gently welcome the viewer into the artwork in order to soften the initial contact with content regarding uncomfortable and often unpublicised traumas.
This interaction therefore spurs a deeper level of engagement with the artwork’s content and builds a level of understanding with the histories being presented. Through these artworks, the artists interrogate notions of the domesticity, generational resilience, and the practice of artistic memorialisation.
The presentation of the exhibition within Firstdraft’s space will engage its audiences in difficult discourses through this methodology. The exhibition will also develop public programs in the form of an interactive lectures to further develop the artists’ processes for engaging the use of gentle aesthetics.
(1) Carmen Glynn-Braun
