Ten Bold New Sydney Art Exhibitions That Will Make Your May

A diverse group exhibition that will please gallery-goers possessing a short attention span and a taste for socially driven art is up next at Campbelltown Arts Centre with Looking At Me Through You.

12 artists from a range of disciplines including painting, sculpture, portraiture and video were invited to create a responsive, socially engaged artwork that interacts with the community of Campbelltown — its people, issues, uniqueness and relationship to the broader Western Sydney landscape.

Artists including Keren Ruki, Damien Shen, James Nguyen, Abdul Abdullah, Sonia Leber and David Chestworth chose to work directly with the community for inspiration, while others have taken a more analytical approach, drawing from statistical research provided by show sponsor Deloitte as the foundation for their artworks.

Expect themes including urban development (and underdevelopment), the diversity of culture and community, the shifting political debate, the collective representation of voice and the uniqueness of Campbelltown as a place. A must see for those who like topical art with local relevance.

New exhibition The Distance continues Tony Lloyd’s fascination with cinematic imagery and its capacity to create anticipation and suspense. This series embraces the apocalyptic film genre (Lloyd is typically influenced by science fiction and film noir) and its heightened drama, with unsettling paintings of asteroids illuminated by car headlights mere moments before they hit earth.

“We are all travelling through space. Earth is our vehicle, the orbital path is our highway,” Lloyd explains of these asteroid works. Driving at night is an inherently cinematic experience for Lloyd, who says watching an external landscape unfold out of the darkness always reminds him of being at the movies.

Despite the foreboding subject, there is also a quiet stillness and spooky level of beauty to the paintings, which place the viewer in the drivers seat, suspending them in what Lloyd describes as “the narrow instant before the distance between present and future is erased.”

Yes, it’s sad but true; Stills Gallery is closing their doors after almost 26 years.

Join them for Curtain Call – a final exhibition that looks back at the gallery’s history, from their humble beginnings in 1991 to now, and presents what they’re calling “the mother of all salon hangs” featuring over 60 artists from close to three decades of exhibitions. Visit their social channels and you’ll also see a featured ‘work a day’, where friends, colleagues, artists and collectors will nominate a work or artist that spoke to them during the gallery’s history.

Co-directors Kathy Freedman and Bronwyn Rennex say: “It has been a privilege to work with such a diverse range of talented artists. And we’ve enjoyed sharing their works with the world – whether in Paddington or Paris, William St or Waterloo… We have relished their power to challenge and move us.”

Head along to pay your respects and bid Stills a fond farewell.

Image: Narelle Autio & Trent Parke, Untitled #29, from The Seventh Wave (1999-2000) Image courtesy of the artists and Stills Gallery, Sydney.

The latest exhibition at Brett Whiteley studio, West of the Divide celebrates what was a lifelong affinity between Whiteley and the land west of Sydney — encompassing Bathurst, Oberon, Sofala and beyond.

Showcasing his iconic, inspired translation of the Australian landscape that combined elements of abstraction and realism in an incredibly lyrical, expressive way, you’ll see both intimate studies and larger poetic works filled with birds, nests, trees, rocks and rivers. This particular collection of paintings, sculpture and drawings — arguably some of his most magical — spans three decades of Whiteley’s career and were personally selected by Wendy Whiteley and Alec George.

If you’re a fan of Whiteley’s work you should also check out the upcoming documentary Whiteley by James Bogle (released May 11), promising to be a “raw and intimate” insight into his both his life and his creative legacy. Bogle and co-writer Victor Gentile have drawn from personal letters, notebooks and photographs and combined them with interviews, re-enactments and animations. Check out the trailer.

Casula Powerhouse is hosting two exhibitions during the citywide Head On Photo Festival. First up is Platforms by Natan Dvir, a photo series that takes the New York underground, its architecture and its people as a subject. Dvir is interested in the way subway platforms, divided as they are by columns and pillars, often resemble a roll of photographic film, as well as the voyeuristic opportunities and subtle interaction — or studious avoidance of it — that commuting involves.

Also showing is Spy/Spy, a series of portraits and candid/street photography by Julien Mignot and Fred Stucin shot during the 2015 and 2016 Cannes Film Festivals. Mignot and Stucin were there working for various magazine publications and the exhibition explores the private, less polished parts of the festival that didn’t end up in glossy print. Think candid shots of models en route to red carpets, snaps of fans coordinating along the Croisette and reflective, shy portraits of celebrities normally known for their rambunctiousness.

Both exhibitions open May 5 with Platforms ending on May 28 and Spy/Spy staying on till June 18.

If you’re a Francophile or a landscape photography fan you won’t want to miss HÔTEL HÔTEL, the debut exhibition from National Geographic multi-award winning travel and documentary photographer Yasmin Mund, in association with Head On Photo Festival.

During a travel-filled 2015, the Sydney-based Mund found herself enchanted by the scenery of Agay, nestled between St Tropez and Cannes on France’s glamorous Cote d’Azur. Over three summer weeks Mund captured the landscape and subtle changes of this quaint town overlooking the Mediterranean, and the result is a series brimming with light, symmetrical composition and a colour palette that deliciously recalls ’70s pop art.

Prints will be available for purchase in limited editions, with 10 percent going to a Kaarmic Education Photography program for girls in rural India that Mund has been closely involved with for several years. Head along to Ravesis, grab a rosé and let the exhibition transport you away from Bondi’s late-autumnal chill and into a balmy Provencal summer.

Fans of street photography from the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s will enjoy this striking exhibition at Olsen Annexe by Juli Balla, who was heavily influenced by films of the same era.

Creating a colour palate that recalls feature films shot in technicolour, playing with saturation and fades, Balla’s shots – resembling film stills – provoke curiosity and questioning in the viewer. Who are these characters and where are they going to? Balla says: “It intrigues me why people are so fascinated by documentary photography from another period of time. The images immediately take on a sense of mystery. As in a film still, the images evoke a feeling of suspended animation, while one tries to decipher what has just happened or about to happen.”

Lovers of vintage fashion will also appreciate the meticulously authentic period wardrobe provided by stylist Janai Anselmi (Balla herself is an established fashion photographer). While you’re at Olsen, make sure to check out Tim Georgeson’s eerily beautiful print series, Oracles.

Image: Juli Balla, Untitled 10 (2017) & Banner Image: Juli Balla, Untitled 22 (2017) 

It’s not often that an art exhibition also offers you the option of grabbing a haircut, but upcoming show Garage Barbershop is offering exactly that. Head down to Blacktown Arts Centre between May 11 and June 3 and you’ll not only see a collection of portraits by international fashion photographer Harold David alongside music and candid video interviews with men from Western Sydney, on Thursdays you can actually get a cut, fade or shave with Charles Lomu at his pop-up barbershop.

David’s portraits, shot in a Blacktown garage, capture the experience of men getting a haircut from Lomu and his five apprentices (‘The Original Five’), exploring not only the act of the haircut itself but how the space provides young men in the community an opportunity for mentoring, bonding and conversation without feeling judged or out of place.

Just a heads up — if you want a barbershop appointment you’ll need to book ahead here.

You’ve probably heard that iconic American street artist Shepard Fairey is coming to town for Vivid Sydney. He’ll be installing his first Australian mural (visit 309 George Street between June 12 and 17 to see him do his thing) and giving a talk at Sydney Town Hall on June 17 as part of the Vivid Ideas Game-Changer program on his body of work and global street art.

What you may not know is that he’ll also be exhibiting 16 of his large-scale music-themed artworks at aMBUSH gallery’s outdoor public art space, OPEN, in Darling Quarter from May 26. Showcasing his passion for music (Fairey DJs, is in a band called Nøise and has crafted album cover artwork for Led Zeppelin and The Smashing Pumpkins, no big deal), each artwork is printed on wood panels using his signature style.

You can visit Revolutions 24 hours a day, seven days a week and for free.

It’s that time of year again — the State Library of NSW is about to play host to the annual globally-touring World Press Photo exhibition. From May 27 to June 25, the library will display over 150 images painstakingly selected from 80,408 submissions by 5034 press photographers, photojournalists and documentary photographers from 126 countries to World Press Photo. That’s a lot of photos.

See what took out first prize in the contest’s 60th year across categories including nature, sport, daily life and contemporary issues. Of course, the winner will be on display too — Burhan Ozbilici’s chilling An Assassination in Turkey, which captured Mevlüt Mert Altıntaş mere moments after shooting the Russian ambassador to Turkey in an Ankara art gallery.

Lighter fare includes a photo by Tomas Munita of The New York Times titled Cuba on the Edge of Change, which won first prize in the Daily Life: Stories category. The image depicts a barber shop — barber shop photography is quite the trend this month — in Cuba’s Old Havana, taken shortly after the death of Fidel Castro.