Repertoires of contention
Tony Garifalakis & Joaquin Segura
Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne | 28 September - 4 November 2017
Opening Thursday 28 September, 6-8pm
Curator: Ivan Muñiz Reed
Tony Garifalakis, Declassified Document #3, 2014. Enamel paint on magazines, 25 x 18 x 1 cm each. Installation view, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2015. Image courtesy of the artist and Hugo Michell Gallery, Melbourne © the artist
About the exhibition:
‘Repertoires of Contention' presents newly commissioned and recent works by Mexico City-based artist Joaquín Segura and Melbourne-based artist Tony Garifalakis at Gertrude Contemporary in Melbourne, during September – November 2017.
Having first connected while in residence at the International Studio and Curatorial Program in New York in 2008, the artists share a strong interest in global structures of power, the ideologies that uphold them and the consequential forces that resist them.
Spanning textile, video, installation, photographic and intervention works, this focused two-person exhibition will provide the opportunity to reveal the conceptual and material ties between their practices that occur in spite of the different cultural, political and economic contexts within which they live and work.
On the backdrop of global political flux and changing sentiment on important issues that will define our collective future (immigration, trade and the environment, for example), the exhibition reminds us of the power of art as a tool for protest and political change, and of the essential role that artists and cultural institutions play globally in challenging people’s perceptions and progressing public debate.
We are thrilled to be working with Gertrude Contemporary as part of their dynamic program of exhibitions in the city of Melbourne. The exhibition will be accompanied by a comprehensive curatorial text that captures the ongoing dialogue that has taken place between the artists and the curator over the years, and contextualises it within the major global shifts that without a doubt have had an influence on their practice. A series of public talks at Gertrude Contemporary and at the Victorian College of Arts will also complement the exhibition.
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.
Media Coverage:
Hudson Brown, Joaquin Segura and Tony Garifalakis: Repertoires of Contention, Concrete Playground, 11 October 2017
Sonia Avila, Repertorios de Contencion, El Excelsior, 29 September 2017
Andrea Candiani, SBS Italian, 11 October 2017
