High Jinks in the Hydrangeas

Tamara Dean’s major solo show High Jinks in the Hydrangeas opened to audiences in November 2021. This landmark exhibition had the inaugural distinction of showing at Ngununggula, the newly established Southern Highland Regional Gallery located in Retford Park. Ngununggula means ‘belonging’ in the Gundungurra language which Dean’s new series echos. 

High Jinks in the Hydrangeas explores Dean’s desire to be in and of nature during the first global lockdown in 2020, and how interior dialogues around isolation was inextricably linked with the escape into the exterior world.

In the edit I was ready to see my body with all of the criticisms I would ordinarily inflict upon myself, but instead I saw something in myself that I had never seen before. I saw courage, agility, humour and strength. Traits that will carry me through the challenges of these times.

In pushing myself both emotionally and physically to create these works I feel that I have come away with the most personal body of work I have ever made.

-Tamara Dean, 2021