‘Living Patterns’ celebrates an expansive definition of abstraction in Australian art. It highlights how artists have engaged with scientific ideas around perception and emotive reactions to colour, shape and form. Many works convey how motifs and symbols from all manner of artistic lineages – recent and ancient – can be applied in new and innovative ways.
While some artworks may look non‑representational on first viewing, artists show how these works are full of encoded cultural knowledge. The exhibition also considers abstraction as a political approach. With contemporary society’s increasing focus on transparency as a shared value, artists here address how concealment is used differently by the powerful and the vulnerable.
Colour Box Abstract Cinema
To celebrate the centenary of the 16mm gauge film format and in response to ‘Living Patterns’, the film program ‘Colour Box’ brings together a selection of contemporary and archival 16mm experimental films to highlight the format’s long-standing relationship with abstract cinema.
Gallery 3 and 4 close 4 February 2024
Image: Jemima Wyman, Australia/United States b.1977 / Aggregrate Icon (Kaleidoscopic Catchment) (detail) 2014 / Hand-cut digital photographs and archival tape / 205cm (diam.) / Purchased 2014. Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art Foundation Grant / Collection: Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art / © Jemima Wyman
