Curator Tim Riley Walsh unpacks Primavera 2025 as a charged snapshot of the present. Blending research and curiosity, we discuss an exhibition shaped by material intensity and the strange distances of life in a digital, post-industrial world.
Featuring five emerging artists from across Australia, Primavera becomes a site of friction and feeling, where sculpture, ambivalence, and making take centre stage.
Installation View, Primavera 2025: Augusta Vinall Richardson (front), Emmaline Zanelli (rear). Image: Hamish McIntosh.
How would you best describe this year’s Primavera?
Primavera is an exhibition series that began at the MCA Australia in 1992 – it has an incredible legacy. Over 250 artists have exhibited. 30 curators have participated. The series has an engrained rhythm and remit: annually celebrating young Australian artists 35 years or under.
This year’s Primavera features five artists: Francis Carmody (NSW/VIC), Alexandra Peters (VIC), Augusta Vinall Richardson (VIC), Keemon Williams (QLD), and Emmaline Zanelli (SA). The exhibition reflects what young artists are concerned with right now: labour, extraction, technology, the digital and production. But this exhibition is also strongly materially-focused, even fixated. There is an industrial quality to many of the works, it is a very physical exhibition. It is overtly a celebration of what I see as a renewed interest in sculpture and installation.
Mood is something I increasingly want to express in the exhibitions I curate. I’ll defer to some of the descriptions of this exhibition shared with me by others: brutalist, ominous, and muscular. A colleague summarised the overriding sensation as being ruled by distance and removal – which sits in contradiction with these artworks’ physical immediacy. Ambivalence interests me greatly as a person. I think that is where a lot of magic is found.
Francis Carmody, Canine Trap (I), 2025. Image: Hamish McIntosh
How did you approach the exhibition development?
I come from an academic background, trained in art history, but grew up in an artistic household. I’d like to think I blend the qualities of both in my curatorial approach.
My process is initially largely instinctive. It is focused on the contemporary. The impetus for my projects emerges from everyday life – the news, literature, popular culture, and of course, art. They begin with what I’d call suspicions. Often about how human behaviour and the world might be changing. I then go out and test this instinct. I observe how current events and actions might confirm or challenge it. From there, I do deeper research into its genealogy to understand where it grew from.
The art might key into the outcomes of my suspicion closely, or it might disagree with it entirely. The exhibition bottles all of that friction and presents it.
Keemon Williams, Business is Booming (detail), 2025, installation view. Image: Hamish McIntosh
This year’s Primavera focuses on making in a “digital and post-industrial era.” What drew you to this theme, and why do you feel it speaks strongly to the experience of young Australian artists today?
I think what sets apart a single exhibition in a long-running exhibition series like this is its point of view, a sense of cut-through. My leading suspicion in Primavera was what I was calling ‘industrial abstraction’. That the objects that structure our lives today are becoming more mysterious to us, how they are made and function – think of the iPhone for example – and that this state of distance is, in multiple senses, manufactured.
The post-industrial era isn’t new – some might even feel it’s a little outdated. I’m curious how its conditions have changed and its level of visibility. It is not unusual to go through a day now and not make anything new in physical space. If we do produce something ‘new’, it is more often immaterial. A playlist. A carousel of images. A vibe.
I was drawn to the idea of industry because it has strong connections to themes in art history. The factory and production, their ties to pop art and constructivism. Thus, the exhibition features a lot of seriality, for obvious reasons. But I was also drawn to the idea because I feel the distance from making myself. I hope the feeling is relatable too.
Artists are especially sensitive towards the world. As a species, humans understand through knowing a thing’s components or ingredients. Artists make every day – and so I turn to them and their art for guidance through the present.
Alexandra Peters, Defenestration (Autoantibodies) as part of The Infinite Image, 2025, installation view. Image: Hamish McIntosh
The show includes artists from several states and very different cultural contexts. What tensions or surprising connections emerged as you researched and met with artists across the country?
On a practical level, Primavera is grounded in a concentrated period of research travel around the country. I met with over 50 artists across seven states.
A studio visit can be an amazing thing. Artists are so open. A lot developed through these encounters and my preconceptions being overturned or troubled. An artist list for the exhibition then starts to emerge from there: which artists might work well in dialogue, but also as counterpoints or even in friction. The promise of what an artist might make or where their energy is currently directed excites me.
Mustering all of those forces and then directing them towards their realisation on opening day is a wild, joyous ride.
Emmaline Zanelli, Magic Cave, 2024/2025, installation view. Image: Hamish McIntosh
What do you hope audiences will take away from Primavera 2025?
The vitality of contemporary Australian art and the innovation of the young artists in this place. Hopefully a sense of confidence in the ongoing relevance of art to reflect the present. That it makes visible something which has been clouded. That it resonates with a feeling they might have about their own worldview right now.
Primavera 2025: Young Australian Artists continues Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Sydney until 9 March
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José is a curator and Director of UNSW Galleries, Sydney. He spends most days looking at art and thinking about exhibition-making.
See José’s selection of must-see museum exhibitions for this summer.
Archie Moore: kith and kin at the Queensland Art Gallery / Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane
Australia’s Golden Lion-winning pavilion from the 2024 Venice Biennale, curated by Ellie Buttrose, has its triumphant homecoming. A work of immense scope in its mapping of human relations and responsibilities, it is, without question, one of the most defining works of contemporary Australian art. Complementing the exhibition is a terrific display from the QAGOMA Collection that focuses on the artistic gesture of mark-making in recording and sharing expressions of life.
Exhibition runs until 18 October
Meanjin | Brisbane
Thomas Demand: The Object Lesson at Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Don’t miss this exhibition, a masterclass in design and curatorial excellence, which runs until January 11, 2026. It features key international works from the Kaldor Collection, displayed in a specially created space by German artist Thomas Demand. The final week also features performances of musician and composer Jules Reidy’s work ‘Only Above’, made in response to the exhibition.
Exhibition runs until 11 January
Gadgial Land | Sydney
Too Deadly: Ten Years of Tarnanthi at Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide
This expansive exhibition recounts a decade of commissioning and acquiring significant works of contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art, and an absolute joy as an exhibition experience. Highlights include the extraordinary paintings of Nyaparu (William) Gardiner and Motorbike Paddy Ngal, alongside the unforgettable installation Kuḻaṯa Tjuṯa featuring 550 spears by artists from the APY Lands in the form of a nuclear explosion.
Exhibition runs until 18 January
Kaurna | Adelaide
John Nixon: Song of the Earth 1968–2020 at Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne
A remarkable survey of the late Australian artist that celebrates his unwavering commitment to experimentation and engagement with abstraction and radical modernism. Curated with care by the artist’s partner, Sue Cramer, this is a wonderfully spirited exhibition and a reminder of how fantastic it is to see an artist’s practice across time.
Exhibition runs until 9 March
Naarm | Melbourne
Yasmin Smith – Elemental Life at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney
Curator Jane Devery continues to provide Sydney audiences with beautifully conceived and poetic exhibitions. This survey of Yasmin Smith is another one, celebrating the artist’s fascinating exploration of history, ecology and geology through ceramics, glazes and form.
Exhibition runs until 8 June
Gadigal Land | Sydney
Guided by instinct and a sensitivity to the emotional weight of everyday spaces, Laura Jones’ practice moves between still life, interior, and memory. We spoke to the artist about her current exhibition, Rooms, at CHALK HORSE. In this conversation, she reflects on the slow pull toward a life in art, the ways intuition shapes her painting process, and how Rooms emerged from a period of personal return and recalibration.
Image: Front Window, 2025
What inspired you to pursue a career in art, and how has your journey as an artist evolved over the years?
It wasn’t an overnight decision to pursue art, but when I was a teenager and young adult figuring out what I wanted to do with my life, I felt a constant and gradual pull towards art. I made decisions that I thought were sensible for my future, but then I couldn’t ignore that I really just needed to try and find a way to make art the centre of my purpose. I finished an arts degree and then decided to enrol in a printmaking masters at UNSW. Funnily enough I met lots of painters in the printmaking department. Seeing how they had studios and lived their lives inspired me to get a studio of my own. Then, I just kept following my gut. I had lots of different part-time jobs, and there were many years where I did a bit of everything, but art became my main purpose and I was determined to pursue it full-time.
Image: Mirror View, 2025
How do you approach the creative process when starting a new painting? Do you have any specific rituals or techniques?
I’m always trying to keep it interesting for myself and expand the framework of how I start a painting series. I tend to think about making a body of work and narrow down my interests at the time. It might be that I’m experimenting with a particular colour or surface and theme, but I try to identify the thread of it early on. And then there will be a painting that I think encapsulates that idea and it becomes the painting I compare every consecutive painting to. I’m always thinking about how to capture emotion and time passing. Still life is very effective for me, but I also try to include some autobiographical elements. I want to document a sense of what the here and now is like, so that when I look back my work has elements of the feeling of a certain time.
Image: Hydrangeas, 2025
Your work often places domestic interior elements alongside evocative natural forms, how is that interplay showing up in the new works at CHALK HORSE?
For Rooms at CHALK HORSE, I was painting vignettes from home. I was trying to make sense of moving home to the town I grew up in after living in S ydney for 20 years. You would think I’d start with landscapes being in the Blue Mountains, but I was somehow drawn to narrowing my perspective to walls and doorways and intimate scenes as a way to settle into the sense of the domestic space as a place to begin opening up. The world has become so overwhelming, and I am very concerned about the future of the planet, our wild places, and the climate. But the way we live is so important to think about. Our indoor life is not at all disconnected from our outdoor one. As I get older, I become more and more sensitive to that. I think back to my grandmother being so waste-conscious. She would use shower caps on bowls instead of Glad Wrap. My Mum repairs everything that breaks and never buys anything on a whim. She thinks about how long it will last and how much she really needs it. Somehow within just a few generations it has become too easy to consume so much, and our waste has exploded, letting our indoor lives become so disconnected from our resources. Anyway, I wanted to make a show that really engaged with the domestic and the handmade. I’ve always been a fan of bringing nature indoors and embracing those elements that make a home feel like home.
Image: Pink Flannel Flower, 2025
Your exhibition at CHALK HORSE Rooms draws on what has been described as a melting pot of memories, premonitions and beauty. How do you navigate this while constructing a single interior or landscape?
I try to keep it simple. It’s important to remember that there’s a language in the way that paint is used. Painting is my outlet, and each painting reflects a small moment of a life that navigates so much emotional terrain. I think you could try and document every tiny emotion and become overwhelmed with trying to squeeze in too much information. Sometimes it’s about what you leave out, when you stop, and how much to leave unanswered for the viewer.
Image: Self Portrait, Kurrajong, 2025
Where do you hope to see your practice in 10 years?
I hope I’m just making better and better paintings for the rest of my life.
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Jones’ exhibition continues at CHALK HORSE until 20 December
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@chalkhorsegallery
Working through layers, erasures, and instinctive gestures, Seraphine Pick builds paintings that pulse with ambiguity – works where identity, sensation, and materiality remain always in motion. We spoke to her about her current exhibition, Twenty 25 at STATION, reflecting on how she is pushing painting into new psychological and tactile territories.
Image: Glitch and Motherboard, 2025
What inspired you to pursue a career in art, and how has your journey as an artist evolved over the years?
I grew up in the 70s in an art environment with young parents who had both been to Ilam Art school in Christchurch, New Zealand, in the late 50s and early 60s. I grew up in the Bay of Islands, and many young university graduates came up here looking for alternative ways of living back then. We lived the first four years on Moturua Island, where my parents were caretakers. When my brother was born, we moved to the mainland to Kororareka (Russell), also in the Bay of Islands.
My father taught art, art history and ceramics at Bay of Islands High School in Kawakawa. My mother painted and looked after us (and there were foster children over many years). They both worked on oyster farms and fishing boats. Many creative people visited over the years, so it was a normal everyday experience to be making or engaging in art. My father taught me to draw and look at his art history books, feeding my interest in art. I just drew all the time. I think because I am profoundly deaf and wasn’t able to participate in all the conversations, I just observed a lot.
I didn’t decide to pursue a career in art until I left school and moved out of home. I just thought I’d try it out as a full-time thing. I had resisted art, with both parents having gone to art school too, but I ended up at the same art school as them, with some of their tutors still there!
My journey as an artist has evolved in many directions, with changes often triggered by experiences along the way, such as places I’ve lived and people I’ve met. It is still evolving, and I hope always will, as I want to experience it in many ways and to keep learning new things within it and around it.
Image: Browser, 2025. Photo by Simon Strong.
Your figures are often ambiguous and shifting. What draws you to this sense of fluid identity?
My approach to painting often begins in an intuitive way, where I just start, and the figures will sometimes emerge in the process of making over time. I do a lot of drawing along with the painting, too. My process is more representative of a bodily sensation than creating an image or figure. I feel that through making or destroying what’s there, I leave a visible history of the painting. All the flaws and accidents become part of the work, making the materiality of the work a sensation as well. I search for the energy of the unseen.
There is an ambiguity in the way figures are in space, as they emerge from the painted surface in an unsure, ghostly and anxious way whilst also embodying a sense of calm too. These works are forever moving and not fixed, becoming a reflection of the natural world that we are a part of, with the painting process directing what to do somewhat as well.
Image: Installation View, Twenty 25, Photo: Simon Strong
The internet and found imagery have played a key role in your work. How do you find the balance between appropriation of external imagery and the painting’s own autonomous language?
I am using found imagery from the internet less and less now. I used it more, along with printed media, as source material for images of unease. Transferring a photograph image to a painting seemed to create more unease, beauty and ambiguity.
I used it back in 2013 more when I made a series about the internet’s early use of social media in public humiliation of young humour with images of drunk people comatose. I liked the ambiguity of the images being peaceful and vulnerable, the space of unease it sat within and the changes of social behaviour evolving with human interaction with the internet. Now I think maybe we have reached a kind of over-saturation point, and I want to just make work where I’m just having a dialogue and responding to through the materiality of the paint or medium I’m using and react to with all the human senses. I’m finding it hard to just illustrate images in oil paint without embodying a sense of being present, too. I am now more interested in how we are in a crisis between our humanity and technology, rapidly changing our behaviour and the natural world we live in, with imagery reflecting it to us.
I want to bring body awareness back into the realm of looking at painting, with technology taking this away more and more from us. Looking at paintings for how it’s made and not just the image alone, something that goes deeper than being saturated in flicking through digital images that hold less information than a painting does. Where you see more, you move closer and scan your eyes over it forensically, and from a distance, you see something different, a change of perception, where you have to move your body into space, not just pinch your fingers out to get closer as we do on a screen.
Image: Sleep, 2025. Photo by Simon Strong.
You often depict the body, or figures in ambiguous psychological spaces. What role does memory play in the construction of such spaces?
My early work was an attempt at visualising how memory and its sensations are forever being reconstructed and their influence on constructing our identity, and this fluidity over time. The methods I used with thick layered white paint, obscuring layers of drawings and scratching into the paint on canvas, I seem to be revisiting again 30 years later, as I’m becoming more interested in exploring texture, the tactile and layering and obscuring information in my work. It also happens to embody my own art past into my older self.
Image: Overflow II, 2025. Photo: Simon Strong.
When people engage with the blurred boundaries and partial narratives in your paintings, what response are you hoping to draw out?
Art is experiential, with each person bringing their own experiences of the world and individual emotional responses to that. It’s this process that completes the work, and where I let it go. I don’t have any specific expectations for bringing out anything in people, but hope there is some level of engagement with their senses to the work; hearing something, remembering something, feeling something. It could also be just looking at the surface and noticing it as a tactile thing to explore, or thinking about something outside of the work in the world. Just a connection of being present, maybe, I like to leave the work open-ended in this way.
Image: E-Mystic I, 2025. Photo: Simon Strong.
As someone whose work spans over three decades, how has your understanding of “what painting is” shifted for you and how do you see your practice expanding on this moving forward?
Actually, it’s nearly four decades now! My first show was in 1989. I’ve explored a lot of threads of ways of painting over the years, for sure. My desire to keep learning, searching, and responding to the world and where I am as a person in it. It’s really a long journey in finding yourself in the end, and that confidence to be yourself in your work.
Painting itself has a primal familiarity for me, as the first thing you do as a child is use your senses to explore the world. Anything sticky or liquid, you use your hands and smear it on something, that’s painting, it’s an action first. You pick up a stick or use your fingers and draw in the sand. It’s an indelible mark; it’s the doing. I see my grandchild doing this now, and I want that sense of immediate connection back. Going forward, I’m trying to just draw it from my intuition in a more freeing way and want to go back to exploring materials more as a way of bringing the tactile back to the forefront. I like to explore and use my perception as an older woman through this process and see where it takes me.
I do like not knowing what I’ll be making ahead, though. It’s good to keep that mystery and exploration alive. My deafness, I realise now, is part of my identity in how I’ve navigated the world and how I create movement in my work like visual sound. I often experience paintings that way.
The last few years, I’ve collaborated with friends who are younger artists of different disciplines: Andrew Bec, a photographer; Jaime Jenkins, a ceramic sculptor; and I will be doing a project with a sculptor next year, Isabella Loudon. It’s an interesting process to collaborate and show work alongside another artist and cross disciplines, and generations. It’s very experimental and interesting, and as an experience, it’s the exchange that you’re left with, that memory of making that you learn so much about your own work as well. It’s also a great antidote to the long hours spent alone in your studio, too!
Painting is a vehicle to engage in the world or to just lose yourself in. It is the paintings’ immersive quality I love. At a certain stage of the process, you are in that calm, relaxing state, then the next thing you can be in a battle with it! It can take you on an emotive ride, and it requires risk-taking to go back to the calm.
Pick’s Exhibition continues at STATION, Melbourne until 24 January
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@stationgalleryaustralia
We caught up with artist Kyra Henley ahead of her exhibition ‘Lost’ at Nasha Gallery. Henley’s painting practice is guided by instinct, visual memory, and a deep curiosity for the discarded and overlooked. In our conversation, she reflects on letting imagery speak for itself, the quiet power of imperfection, and why—after decades of painting—she feels like she’s only just begun.
Cover Image: Party Salads, 2025
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What inspired you to pursue a career in art, and how has your journey as an artist evolved over the years?
I don’t think I have pursued a career exactly. I went to art school straight after high school, 17 and desperate to leave the small town I grew up in. I’ve continued painting since the degree (supporting myself with stupid money paying jobs) and now it’s almost 25 years later and my painting has evolved into what I feel like is my real starting point to the actual work that I will make.
Image: Swimmers, 2024
Your paintings mix personal memories with pop culture —how do you balance what’s personal with the bigger social commentary in your work?
It’s probably impossible for anyone to make anything without a personal layer to it! But it’s not intentional of me, I make images precisely because of my poor ability to express ideas in any coherent verbal or literary way. There may be some link in my brain missing and painting is my way of trying to understand the world and my thoughts on things. It’s very difficult for me to explain using words. Or is it something I do to distract myself from all of that? I don’t know. Probably both.
Image: Horse, 2025
How and where do you start your process of sourcing and reworking found imagery?
I start with secondhand books, usually from op shops or discarded on the street. I mostly avoid the internet but sometimes I want a particular thing to add to a painting and will go there. The colour of the printing inspires me, bright but yellowed with age, you get interesting effects from the limitations of the printing processes of the time.
A lot of ‘bad’ photos make it in because this is all before you could take a million photos for free and clean them up with a few clicks – I’m drawn to them because they haven’t been rendered all slick & uniform & bland.
These books are from a time in the recent past when everyone bought books of photographs of people and landscapes and gave them to each other with inscriptions scrawled in them like “ Dear Julie, Merry Christmas from mummy & daddy, 1978″. I have a large collection of these unwanted smelly books and I like spending time with them. I regularly go through tearing out things that catch my eye. When starting a painting I collage the images together with scissors and glue arranging ouija board style until I have something I want to scale up onto a canvas. It’s all pretty intuitive, and I will make formal decisions later on during the painting to block things out or move them or add something.
Image: The Devils Marbles, 2025
You’ve described your works as something for people to “ingest” — what do you hope people feel or think when they spend time with your images?
I try to make the paintings beautifully painted, to be enjoyed simply for their aesthetic qualities, but there’s more there if you have the time and inclination to sit with them. I love some of the narratives people have come up with for the paintings in this current show at Nasha; some things align with thoughts I’d had but often it’s something I hadn’t thought of at all and it makes complete sense in the picture and seems obvious and like that’s what I had intended all along.
Take the text by Steven Latimer we’ve used for the exhibition – It’s an extreme take on the paintings but it makes sense to me, it’s Steve’s take on it. I love it. The way people have engaged with the work keeps me excited to do more and helps me process what the hell I’m doing.
Image: Hotel, 2025
Where do you hope to see yourself, your practice, in 10 years?
Painting is one of the few occupations that gets better with age, perhaps because you lose some self-consciousness.
I’ve spent a couple decades refining some basic skills and now I can use those tools to invest time in looking and thinking about what I’m trying to do, or what the work is showing me. I’m not sure where I’m going, I feel like I’ve just begun.
Henley’s exhibition continues at Nasha Gallery until 26 October.
Kasia Töns’ practice is shaped by myth, movement, and visceral encounter, often beginning with an inefficiency or gesture that becomes a ritual.
We spoke to her about her current exhibition, ‘The Mage’ at MARS Gallery, reflecting on obsession, malleability, and embracing hand-made processes in an age of acceleration.
Cover Image: Tom MacCammon
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What inspired you to pursue a career in art, and how has your journey as an artist evolved over the years?
Like a lot of my peers who have sustained lengthy arts practices, it’s not about pursuing a career but about pursuing an obsession. To expect art to be a career might not be so sustainable. With all the rejection and low income living, these things may be too much of a struggle unless art making is a compulsion you can’t live without. My journey as an artist has always been one of play, intuition, endurance and ultimately my tool for understanding the world around me. I use very simple techniques not dissimilar to my early projects, but what has shifted is my methodology. While I used to make very personal works, I have become a lot more research based, this has expanded my practice, in scope and allowed for engagement with wider audiences.
Image: Caterpillar, 2025
In your current exhibition, you explore transformation through endurance and self-imposed rituals. Can you speak to how these themes connect with your own creative process?
Every project I do involves some sort of literal self-transformation. I get so invested and entwined with my subject matter that I think I need to become what I’m researching. At the completion of past projects some of the identities I thought I needed to transition into have been – a traditional broom maker, gardener, herbalist, bushwalking adventure guide, designer for disaster zones. It’s happened so many times that I recognise it both as part of the process and my personality, but it doesn’t prevent me from currently planning to undertake survival skills training and spend the rest of my days walking like the women I’ve recently been researching. Having this malleability is a help and a hinderance, it allows me to go deep into projects but also creates a rawness to work through when it is over and I realise I am me again and will always be an artist.
Image: Despite the Storm, Because of the Storm, 2025
Much of your practice involves following natural forces—like tides, weather, or instinct. How do these experiences outside the studio influence the way you construct your textile works?
Everything I do begins with a lot of uncertainty, a composition is never fixed from the start, my works are active research aides, journals, paths to understand and connect many, seemingly disparate ideas. My process is as inefficient as following a tide or a river but that’s fine with me. I like to take my time and hand stitched textiles can’t be rushed even if you’d like to try. The pace of pushing a needle into a piece of fabric and pulling it back out again and again travels at the sort of pace that is probably natural for us, slow gratification that you must really toil over rather than instant but fleeting rewards.
Image: Sigil Magic Mask 1, 2025
What kind of experience do you hope to create for the viewer through your exhibition?
I hope to give the viewer a similar experience to what I feel when looking at the work of other textile artists. The materiality of textiles is like entering a rabbit hole, the closer you look, the more is revealed. Stitches as markings of time, symbols to decode, And discovering marks of underdrawings that haven’t been erased or covered over as a peek into the planning and process of the maker. In an age where we can outsource creativity to an AI bot, to stand in front of something that is unmistakably made by hand, mistakes and all is something special.
Image: Calling Out, Calling In, 2025
Where do you hope to see yourself, your practice, in 10 years?
Working from a transportable studio and collaborating with inspiring people on cross disciplinary projects. (and getting paid well to do so, I’ll be 50 by then so some financial stability would be very nice).
Töns’ exhibition continues at MARS Gallery until 8 November.
In a city where surf culture meets high culture, Michelle Grey and Susan Armstrong of Arts-Matter are helping shape Sydney’s creative identity from the inside out. With a passion for connecting people to art in meaningful ways, they offer a grounded perspective on what makes the city’s cultural life so dynamic. We caught up with them ahead of Sydney Contemporary to talk about their must-see exhibitions, favourite local spots, and why Sydney’s mix of natural beauty and artistic energy is unlike anywhere else.
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What makes Sydney stand out as a cultural destination?
Sydney’s distinction lies in its ability to seamlessly intertwine lifestyle and culture—a combination not many cities in the world can claim. Few places in the world allow you to spend the morning riding the perfect wave, the afternoon exploring a world-class museum, and the evening indulging in some of the city’s most exciting culinary experiences. On the surface, Sydney offers the cultural institutions you’d expect—art, dance, music, and theatre—but the real richness lies just beneath. For those willing to venture beyond the obvious, the city and its surrounding regions are alive with creative discoveries: independent galleries, experimental performances, and local makers redefining what contemporary culture can be. It’s this combination of natural wonder, iconic experiences and hidden gems that makes Sydney unique.
After a day of exploring Sydney Contemporary, where would you go for dinner and drinks to continue the evening?
After a day of art consumption at Sydney Contemporary, we’d start the evening with drinks and a performance at The Vanguard. Housed in a beautifully restored Art Deco building, it offers an intimate atmosphere where live music and cabaret create a sense of timeless glamour. For dinner, we’d head to Maiz in Newtown, a contemporary Mexican restaurant that elevates the humble taco into something extraordinary—bold flavours and thoughtful presentations that perfectly capture the neighbourhood’s creative energy. To end the night, The Abercrombie is hard to resist. With its layered spaces, from rooftop terraces to buzzing dance floors, it has redefined Sydney’s late-night scene, and we’re here for it.
Image left: The Vanguard, image source The Vanguard. Image right: Maiz Newtown, image source Broadsheet.
What cultural events or exhibitions coincide with the Sydney Contemporary that you recommend?
We recommend checking out Renee Estee’s exhibition at COMA and Alex Seton’s new body of work at Sullivan & Strumpf—both highlight the strength and diversity of Australian contemporary practice. Over at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Kaldor Public Art Project 38, curated by Thomas Demand, is an ambitious and thought-provoking commission that really anchors the city within an international conversation. If you’re lucky enough to secure a ticket, a performance at Phoenix Central Park is truly unforgettable—the pairing of world-class musicians with such an extraordinary architectural space makes it unlike anywhere else. And for something a little more unexpected, taking a dance class at Groove Therapy in Marrickville is a joyful way to tap into the city’s creative energy from the inside out.
Image: Phoenix Central Park, image source The Local Project.
If you have friends visiting from outside of town, what are you adding to their itinerary?
We have so many creative friends who come to Sydney and skip the ocean. A swim at one of our incredible coastal beaches is a non-negotiable.
Do you have a favourite public art installation or mural in the city? What makes it special?
One of our favourite public art installations in Sydney has to be Louise Bourgeois’ Maman at Sydney Modern. Towering over the gallery forecourt at nine metres high, this monumental spider sculpture is both arresting and enigmatic, immediately commanding attention while inviting reflection. What makes it truly special is how it balances scale with intimacy—the imposing bronze structure evokes themes of motherhood, protection, and memory, yet its intricate details reward close inspection. Experiencing Maman in the context of the Sydney Modern, alongside Bourgeois’ deeply evocative Day and Night galleries, transforms it from a standalone sculpture into a profound encounter with emotion, architecture, and the power of contemporary art to engage both the body and the imagination.
Image: Maman, Louise Bourgeois, image source Art Gallery of New South Wales.
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@arts__matter
Andrew is a Managing Director at MA Financial Group, the Principal Partner of Sydney Contemporary, and the Head of the firm’s Asset Management business. He has over 30 years’ experience in global investments as a principal investor and adviser across a range of sectors including real estate, infrastructure, private equity and energy. Driven by a strong passion for the arts, Andrew founded the MA Art Prize, complemented by his personal collection of contemporary art chronicling Australia’s artistic talent over recent decades.
Over the years, Andrew Martin has built a significant collection with a strong focus on Australian abstraction, Indigenous art, and emerging talent. We spoke with him about how his collecting journey began, the importance of following your instincts, and the artists he’s most excited about today.
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What made you want to start collecting art, and how has your approach to collecting evolved over time?
Looking back there was no real catalyst. I didn’t grow up with art, and nor do I claim to have much artist ability. I got the bug in my mid 20’s and it has been a passion ever since.
What was the first piece of art you ever bought, and do you still own it?
My first piece was a very early Ildiko Kovacs. I think she painted the work soon after leaving art school. I still own the work and it remains one of my favourites. Since then, I have purchased a number of her works which have traversed her entire career.
Picture: Ildiko Kovacs, Untitled
Is there a focus in artists in your collection? Are you more interested in emerging or well-known artists?
My main focus is abstract art. I collect both emerging and well-known artists. Many of the emerging artists have graduated from being “emerging” at the time of purchase. These artists include works Ildiko Kovacs, Stepehen Harvey, Dale Frank, James McGrath, John Young and David Larwill. Established, well known artists in the collection include Brett Whiteley, John Olsen, Sydney Ball, John Coburn and Robert Owen. My favourite up and coming artists in the collection include Ramash Mario Nithiyendran, Ryan Hoffman and Claire Healy & Sean Cordeiro.
I also collect indigenous artists which include Paddy Bedford, Ronnie Tjampitjinpa and Yaritji Young.
I travel to Asia and particularly China a lot for work and as a result some Chinese contemporary artists are making their way into the collection including Zhuang Hong-yi and Huang Yan.
I am also very fortunate to be on MA Financial’s corporate art collection committee, where we focus mainly on Australian emerging artists.
What advice would you give to someone looking to make their first purchase at Sydney Contemporary?
Follow what you love – don’t try and pick the latest trend or what you guess might appreciate. Apart from Whiteley, I have never purchased with a pure investment lens. Having said that, I love his works and am not interested in selling them.
Picture: Brett Whiteley, Waratah, 1970
Was there a piece of art that got away?
My big regret is not going much earlier and harder in collecting Whiteleys. For me he is Australia’s leading artist, and from an investment point of view, his works have done extraordinarily well.
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About MA Financial Group
MA Financial Group is a global alternative asset manager specialising in private credit, real estate and hospitality. We lend to property, corporate and specialty finance sectors and provide corporate advice.
We invest and manage $12.7 billion on behalf of our clients, are responsible for $155 billion in managed loans and have advised on over $125 billion in advisory and equity capital market transactions.
We have over 700 professionals across locations in Australia, China, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Singapore and the United States.
For more information, please visit:
Website: https://mafinancial.com
Linkedin: @MAFinancial Group
Instagram: @mafinancial__
Narrowing down highlights from Sydney Contemporary 2025 is no easy task. We’ve asked sharp-eyed art lovers to share what they are most looking forward to seeing at this year’s Fair.
Arts advocate and Venue Owner and Operator of The Vanguard Beau Neilson, shares her top picks for this year’s fair. Here’s what caught her eye at Sydney Contemporary 2025.
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Talks
Designing Spaces for an Artful Life
Friday, September 12, 2025 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM
Talks Space, Carriageworks
Hotels, galleries and offices can optimise the emotional impact of art and design to create highly desirable environments beyond the home. This session brings together: the interior designer of Sydney’s chicest new hotel, the architects of some of NSW’s major cultural destinations and a gallerist renowned for parlaying artists into some of the most chic hospitality and workplace settings.
“Collectibles in our homes often become our gateway into art collecting later in life.”
Learn More: Designing Spaces for an Artful Life
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The Art of Going Public: Behind the Scenes of Public Art
Thursday, September 11, 2025 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
Talks Space, Carriageworks
Public art continues to be a vital and growing part of the arts sector – and increasingly central to contemporary artistic practise. Sydney is renowned for its bold and visible public art, but how do these projects actually come to life? Who funds them, who collaborates on them, and what value do they bring to our city? Join us for an open, “ask us anything” conversation with key players behind public art: an artist, a curator, a developer, a local council rep, and a maker. Together they’ll unpack the processes, partnerships and possibilities that shape art in the public realm.
“Public art has the power to transform spaces and create bold, uniting experiences.”
Learn More: The Art of Going Public: Behind the Scenes of Public Art
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Installations
Jonny Niesche with Mark Pritchard
Sound and Vision (Reflect what you are, in case you don’t know), 2025
Presented by 1301SW | STARKWHITE
Jonny Niesche expands painting into a multisensory experience, merging colour, light, surface, and sound to heighten our perceptual awareness. His reflective and translucent surfaces—crafted from sheer fabrics, reflective metals, and mirrored substrates—create visual fields that shift in response to the viewer’s movement and their architectural surrounds.
For Installation Contemporary, Niesche presents a major new work that builds on recent collaborations with Mark Pritchard. These installations utilise low-frequency sound and vibration to subtly activate the body and space, creating a synesthetic encounter with Niesche’s paintings. Drawing on the atmospheric qualities of colour field painting, psychedelia, and spiritual abstraction, these works invite a contemplative, almost meditative engagement with the sensorial present.
“Really interested in how sonic experiences shape visual ones. This promises to be beautifully immersive.”
Learn More: Installation Contemporary
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Artists
Mike Hewson – Michael Lett Gallery
Image: Mike Hewson, GeoPets, 2025, studio production detail. Courtesy of the artist and Michael Lett, Auckland
“His engineering background and innovative use of materials shows us beauty in things too easily overlooked. He’s also my partner, so I’ve had a ring side seat to the works’ creation.”
Learn More: Michael Lett Gallery
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Nic Fern – C. Gallery
Image: Nic Fern, ‘The Allegory of Bloom’, 2025. Photo by Joshua Morris.
“Her embroidery work is both charming and deeply reflective.”
Learn More: C. Gallery
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Yang Yongliang – Sullivan + Stumpf
“His work is always arresting and I enjoy how he challenges the line between city and nature.”
Learn More: Sullivan + Stumpf
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Atong Atem – MARS Gallery
Image: Atong Atem, 3 of Cups, 2025. Courtesy of MARS and the artist.
“Intimate portraiture and vibrant textiles create compelling and personal visual narratives.”
Learn More: MARS Gallery
Locally, for those seeking a drink and a change of scenery on Sunday afternoon the 14th, The Vanguard is hosting “Ricardo’s presents Velvet” – this music event resurrects Sydney’s underground sound where community, emerging talent, and creativity converge.
Narrowing down highlights from Sydney Contemporary 2025 is no easy task. We’ve asked sharp-eyed art lovers to share what they are most looking forward to seeing at this year’s Fair.
Poppy Lissiman, the founder and creative director of her namesake accessories brand, is known for her bold aesthetic and deep appreciation for visual culture. Poppy shares her top picks, from immersive installations to standout talks and new work by contemporary artists.
Here’s what caught her attention at this year’s fair.
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Talks
When Art Meets Commerce: The Power of Cross-Industry Collaboration
Friday, September 12, 2025 11:30 AM – 12:30 PM
Talks Space, Carriageworks
Four industry-leaders discuss strategies for forging and nurturing meaningful relationships between artists & designers, architects & decorators with art consultants, curators, galleries and collectors – and how these deep relationships benefit the sector as a whole. A linchpin Leading Sydney art dealer Joanna Stumpf is joined by a prominent Auckland design/art space Director, Zoe Black and visionary artist Jonny Niesche whose commissioned collaboration with Gucci has been emblazoned across SoHo, New York. Hear how you can optimise on the growing opportunities between cross-industry collaboration. This will be followed by a guided tour of select gallery booths throughout the fair. Moderated by Stephen Todd.
“This talk immediately struck a cord with me, as collaborating with artists is one of the facets of my work in fashion I cherish the most. It’s a privilege to share with my audience the artists who shape and inspire me, and even more to immerse myself in a creative process defined by the artist’s which is so different from the conventional structures of design.”
Learn More: When Art Meets Commerce: The Power of Cross-Industry Collaboration
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Designing Spaces for an Artful Life
Friday, September 12, 2025 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM
Talks Space, Carriageworks
Hotels, galleries and offices can optimise the emotional impact of art and design to create highly desirable environments beyond the home. This session brings together: the interior designer of Sydney’s chicest new hotel, the architects of some of NSW’s major cultural destinations and a gallerist renowned for parlaying artists into some of the most chic hospitality and workplace settings.
“This was one of my favourite talk topics from last year, as someone who is deeply passionate about interior design I found this talk to be incredibly insightful about living with art and its relationship with your surroundings.”
Learn More: Designing Spaces for an Artful Life
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Installations
Jonny Niesche with Mark Pritchard
Sound and Vision (Reflect what you are, in case you don’t know), 2025
Presented by 1301SW | STARKWHITE
Jonny Niesche expands painting into a multisensory experience, merging colour, light, surface, and sound to heighten our perceptual awareness. His reflective and translucent surfaces—crafted from sheer fabrics, reflective metals, and mirrored substrates—create visual fields that shift in response to the viewer’s movement and their architectural surrounds.
For Installation Contemporary, Niesche presents a major new work that builds on recent collaborations with Mark Pritchard. These installations utilise low-frequency sound and vibration to subtly activate the body and space, creating a synesthetic encounter with Niesche’s paintings. Drawing on the atmospheric qualities of colour field painting, psychedelia, and spiritual abstraction, these works invite a contemplative, almost meditative engagement with the sensorial present.
“I’m most looking forward to Sound and Vision (Reflect what you are, in case you don’t know), 2025 by Jonny Niesche with Mark Pritchard. Niesche’s works already command a space through their visual force, so to step into an environment where his vision unfolds though light, sound and sensory immersion feels especially thrilling. The David Bowie reference only deepens its allure.”
Learn More: Installation Contemporary
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Artists
EG Projects
Image Left: Amanda Bell, We are the Crow……. 2025. Courtesy of EG Projects and the artist.
Image Right: Wendy Warrie, Pyramid Hill 2025. Courtesy of EG Projects and the artist.
“I can never miss my favourite booth from Emilia Galatis Projects; this year I’m particularly eager to see her showcase of five extraordinary Indigenous women: May Chapman, Doreen Chapman, Wendy Warrie, Leah Umbagai, and Amanda Bell. Their work speaks in profoundly visual languages deeply rooted in rich familial lineage and Pilbara, Kimberly, Martu and Nyoongar Country —blending inherited storytelling traditions with bold personal expression.”
Learn More: EG Projects
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Atong Atem – MARS Gallery
Image: Atong Atem, 3 of Cups, 2025. Courtesy of MARS and the artist.
“Additionally I’m looking forward to seeing more of Atong Atem’s striking photographic works. I was lucky enough to pick up a small piece of her’s from MARS gallery at last year’s Sydney Contemporary that has become a cherished piece in my collection.”
Learn More: MARS Gallery
