EIGHT YOUNG AUSTRALIAN ARTISTS ANNOUNCED FOR ......Eight Australian artists aged 35 and under, have been selected to exhibit their work at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

Major PartnerGovernment Partners

Eight Australian artists aged 35 and under, have been selected to exhibit their work at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA) for Primavera 2017, opening 23 August. Working in a range of disciplines, across four states in Australia and residencies overseas; the artists in this years’ exhibition include Jacobus Capone (WA), Adam John Cullen (VIC), Nicole Foreshew (NSW), Teelah George (WA), Laura Hindmarsh (TAS), Elena Papanikolakis (NSW), Tom Polo (NSW) and Kynan Tan (WA/NSW).

Since 1992, Primavera has kick-started the careers of young arts practitioners. For the 26th edition of Primavera, curator Sophia Kouyoumdjian will work with artists to explore the theme of ‘Ancient Futures’. Each work in the exhibition considers existence, from the personal to the universal, in relation to archives, collections or the act of collecting.

MCA Director, Elizabeth Ann Macgregor OBE said: ‘The momentum and excitement is building for Primavera 2017. Sincere thanks goes to Sophia, who brings her knowledge and experience of working directly with artists at Parramatta Artists Studios to curate what we can already tell will be a thought-provoking exhibition, featuring the work of eight of Australia’s most interesting young artists.’

Curator Kouyoumdjian, has worked in the arts sector for over 15 years across directorial, curatorial and exhibition management roles and is currently the Coordinator of Parramatta Artist Studios. Previously she worked as the Acting Director and Curator at Blacktown Arts Centre and has comprehensive experience in Western Sydney’s contemporary art community.

Image: Jacobus Capone, Dark Learning (still), 2015, multi-channel video, high definition, colour, sound, image courtesy and © the artist

EIGHT YOUNG AUSTRALIAN ARTISTS ANNOUNCED FOR PRIMAVERA �� August – �� November ��FREE ENTRY

MEDIA CONTACTS Claire Johnson / Myriam Conrie T 02 9245 2417 / 2434 M 0429 572 869E [email protected] [email protected]


EIGHT YOUNG AUSTRALIAN ARTISTS ANNOUNCED FOR PRIMAVERA �� August – �� November �� FREE ENTRY

Curator, Sophia Kouyoumdjian said: ‘Exhibited works will question natural and human-made archives, from the physical to the digital; of mining the earth to mining of data, thought and processes; of the capturing of history as well as its making; and how the archaeological and the act of erasure can reveal fundamental notions of the human condition.’

‘I am honoured to be working with MCA and eight fantastic artists. This project has allowed me to engage with these artists in their studios, study their artistic practices, and collaborate with them to create something extraordinary to share with the community’, Kouyoumdjian added.

Audi Australia will continue its support of the MCA and Primavera as Major Partner in 2017. This is the second year Audi Australia has sponsored the exhibition. This continues the significant contribution the company makes to supporting innovative and creative talent in Australia and internationally.

Audi Australia Managing Director, Paul Sansom said: ‘Audi’s love of Vorsprung, or ‘progress’ is perfectly reflected in this exhibition. Primavera brings together some of the most talented and creative young artists whose work challenges our own thinking.’ Primavera 2017 will take place in the MCA’s Level 1 South Gallery, free to the public, along with curator and artist talks, and tours. The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication featuring commissioned texts on each of the artists.

Primavera was initiated in 1992 by Dr Edward Jackson AM, Mrs Cynthia Jackson AM and their family in memory of their daughter and sister Belinda, a talented jeweller who died at the age of 29.

Further detail of the exhibition, including an interview with the Curator can be found at AudiMagazine.com.au.

Left: Kynan Tan, Polymorphism (still), 2016, single-channel video, colour, sound, image courtesy and © the artist

Right: Teelah George, Sky Piece, 2016–17, installation view, Artspace, Sydney, thread, linen, bronze, oil paint, image courtesy and © the artist, photograph: Zan Wimberley

http://audimagazine.com.au/



JACOBUS CAPONE (WA) Born 1986, Perth, WA. Lives and works Perth.

Jacobus Capone’s practice incorporates performance, photography, video installation, painting and site-specific work. Characteristically evocative and poetic, his work frequently combines physically demanding durational performances with majestic, sublime landscapes.

The artist recently presented Forgiving Night for Day at Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts as part of the 2017 Perth International Arts Festival, and was included in the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art’s NEW16 exhibition. He has participated in numerous international festivals, fellowships, and residencies. The artist is the recipient of the 2016 John Stringer Prize and a finalist in the 2017 Ramsey Art Prize at the Art Gallery of South Australia. Capone received a Bachelor of Fine Art from Edith Cowan University in 2007. ADAM JOHN CULLEN (VIC) Born 1985, Yass, VIC. Lives and works Melbourne, VIC.

Adam John Cullen is a Melbourne-based visual artist, largely working with sculpture and installation. Key themes explored across his practice are ideas of commodity exchange and trade, as well as the personal histories of found objects.

He completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts at RMIT University in 2005 and Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) at Monash University in 2008. Recent solo and group exhibitions include Gertrude Glasshouse, Melbourne (forthcoming 2017); Paraphrase, Assembly Point, Melbourne (2017); Bapaume Street, ALASKA Projects, Sydney (2016): Floating Ground, The Honeymoon Suite, Melbourne (2016); Burnout, ALASKA Projects, Sydney (2015): Sydney Contemporary, Alaska Projects, Sydney, 2015; Settle, TCB Art Inc, Melbourne (2014). Adam was a finalist in the 2015 Sidney Myer Fund Australian Ceramic Art Award, Shepparton Art Museum, and is currently a studio artist at Gertrude Contemporary. NICOLE FORESHEW (NSW) Born 1982, Sydney, NSW. Lives and works Sydney. A Sydney-based Aboriginal artist Nicole Foreshew, a member of the Wiradjuri nation, Central West NSW, works across a range of mediums, from photomedia, design to sculpture, film and video. Throughout her practice the artist explores links to place, cultural memory and ancestry.

Foreshew has taken part in numerous exhibitions across Australia and internationally, including Shimmer, presented as part of Tarnanthi: Festival of Contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art, Jam Factory Adelaide (2015); Wiradjuri Ngurambanggu, Murray Art Museum Albury (2015); Born in Darkness Before Dawn, Eora Journey, City of Sydney (2014); Hereby Make Protest, Carriageworks (2014); and Shadowlife, Bendigo Art Gallery (2013). In 2015 she was Curatorial Fellow at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia and curator of Primavera 2015.

PRIMAVERA �� – Artist Biographies



TEELAH GEORGE (WA) Born 1984, Perth, WA. Lives and works Perth.

Teelah George is a Perth-based artist working primarily in painting, drawing, print and installation. She employs archives and collections as a point of departure and questioning within her practice, drawing on the parallel ambiguities between historical record and visual art.

She is a finalist in the 2017 Ramsey Art Prize at the Art Gallery of South Australia and was awarded the non-acquisitive prize at the 2015 Fremantle Arts Centre Print Award. Recent exhibitions include Our Studio Selves, Artspace, Sydney (2017); Lovers’ Ponytails, Orexart, Auckland, New Zealand (2017); Artist Profile: Australasian Painters 2007–2017, Orange Regional Gallery (2017); Yellowing, FELTspace, Adelaide (2016); and Methods for Making Eye Contact, Firstdraft, Sydney (2016). LAURA HINDMARSH (TAS/UK) Born 1987, Miri, Maylasia. Lives and works Hobart, TAS, and Cambridge, UK.

Laura Hindmarsh’s practice is interdisciplinary and performative often taking the form of moving image. In each incidence the work is an interrogation of the chosen medium, often pushing the mode of production and the body’s engagement in this process to a point of exhaustion or collapse. Working with processes of embodiment, repetition and layering, Hindmarsh highlights and questions established modes of representation and knowledge systems.

Her film and video works have screened at prestigious festivals in Australia, UK and Europe such as the Edinburgh International Film Festival; Contact Festival of Experimental Film and Video, London; and Process Experimental Film Festival, Riga. Recent exhibitions include Passages, Contemporary Art Tasmania, Hobart (2017); Finding Focus, PhotoAccess, Canberra (2016); Exhaust, Contemporary Art Tasmania, Hobart (2016); and Atavast, Standard Practice, Room Service, New York, USA (2015). CURATOR – SOPHIA KOUYOUMDJIAN (NSW) Sophia Kouyoumdjian has worked in the arts sector for over 15 years across directorial, curatorial and exhibition management roles. Currently the Coordinator, Parramatta Artist Studios and previously the Acting Director and Curator at Blacktown Arts Centre, Sophia has comprehensive experience in Western Sydney’s contemporary art community. She is currently a Board Member of the Information and Cultural Exchange (Parramatta) and a Committee Member of Sydney Arts Management Advisory Group.




ELENA PAPANIKOLAKIS (NSW) Born 1984, Cootamundra, NSW. Lives and works Sydney, NSW.

Elena Papanikolakis works across painting, collage, drawing and photography. Her recent work involves explorations of disparate found imagery and text, as well as material of personal and cultural significance.

In 2016, Papanikolakis was awarded the Eva Breuer Travelling Art Scholarship and the Art Gallery of New South Wales’ Studio Scholarship at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. From 2014–2016, she undertook a studio residency at the Parramatta Artist Studios, Sydney. Recent exhibitions include You Are Invited, Watters Gallery, Sydney (2016); Trips, Firstdraft, Sydney (2015); Parramatta Artist Studios @ Artspace, Artspace, Sydney (2015); Hazelhurst Art on Paper Award 2015, Hazelhurst Regional Gallery & Arts Centre, Sydney (2015); and Two Dee/Three Dee, Platform Public Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne (2012).

TOM POLO (NSW) Born 1985, Sydney, NSW. Lives and works Sydney.

Tom Polo uses painting and painted environments to explore how conversation, doubt, gesture and ways of looking are embodied within abstracted acts of portraiture. Frequently incorporating text and figurative elements, his works draw on acute observations, absurdist encounters and personal histories. An ongoing interest across his practice is the emotional and performative relationships between people within social space.

Since 2007, he has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in Australia and internationally. Recent projects include (These Things) Tell Me More About You, Mornington Peninsular Regional Gallery, Mornington, VIC (2017); Looking at Me Through You, Campbelltown Arts Centre, Sydney (2017); Emotional Patrol, STATION, Melbourne (2017); and What Goes On Here, Spectrum Now, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney (2016). Polo was awarded the Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship in 2015 and completed residencies at the Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris and ACME Studios, London in 2016. He is currently a studio artist at Artspace, Sydney.

KYNAN TAN (WA/NSW) Born 1988, Perth, WA. Lives and works Sydney, NSW.

Kynan Tan is interested in networks, data, relationality and digital systems of control, exploring these areas through digitally-derived artworks. His works engage with digital aesthetics, code and data, and take the form of multi-channel audio-visual performances, installations, sculptures, sound, and 3D simulations.

Tan has performed widely in Australia, Japan, Germany and New Zealand at events such as Test Tone, Tokyo; Channels Video Art Festival, Melbourne; and The NOW now Festival, Sydney. Recent exhibitions include Polymorphism, Artspace, Sydney (2016); Automated Reasoning Paradigm, Firstdraft, Sydney (2016); Longli International New Media Arts Festival, Longli Ancient Town, China (2016); Didactic Tools, Fremantle Arts Centre, WA (2015); and Dead Ringer, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (2015). He is currently a PhD candidate at UNSW Art & Design.


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EIGHT YOUNG AUSTRALIAN ARTISTS ANNOUNCED FOR ......Eight Australian artists aged 35 and under, have been selected to exhibit their work at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia