Alex Prager

Overview

Are you already missing your summer routine of lazily re-watching old classics? The NGV have just the thing. Dripping with saturated colour and packed full of femme fatales, the photographs of Alex Prager will transport you straight back to the intrigue and drama of your favourite Hitchcock film. In this, her first solo show down under, you can see a vast array of her works ranging from 2007 until the present day. But, trust us: you'll walk out feeling as though you just took a trip to 1960s Hollywood.

Highly reminiscent of the work of fellow US photographer Cindy Sherman, Prager's work often deals with issues of representation and reality; in particular a familiar kind of hyper-stylised retro femininity. In her aptly-titled Polyester series, Prager's women are clad in go-go dresses, wigs, thick slicks of liquid eyeliner and thrown into various uncertain terrains. Think: Twin Peaks in lurid technicolour.

But to get the full force of this Lynch-inspired madness, you should head straight for her latest work Face in the Crowd. Conveyed via three-channel video, this complex and straight-up beautiful photographic series guides you through the heavily stylised crowds on American beaches, in train stations, movie theatres, airports and parks with the help of The Hunger Games' own Elizabeth Banks.

Bonus: the artist has even curated a handy exhibition e-book to guide you through it all.