At the 2024 edition of Sydney Contemporary, Michael Reid Sydney + Berlin will present a bold new photographic series by leading contemporary artist Dr Christian Thompson AO.

Titled Yabunbarru, this suite of four spectacular new images marks a thrilling evolution of the Bidjara artist’s singular practice and arrives at a significant moment in his globally celebrated career.

Earlier this year, Thompson was one of eight international artists chosen by the Marina Abramović Institute for a program of original performances staged at the Adelaide Festival. This project was closely followed by a major solo exhibition at the 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, which saw the public debut of newly commissioned still and moving images alongside select works from his photographic archive. The debut of Yabunbarru also precedes MELT Festival, for which the artist will exhibit oversize photographs across the city of Brisbane.

Building on these recent creative triumphs while reflecting on the themes that have threaded through his practice over more than two decades, the artist’s upcoming series presents a dazzling inversion of the visual dynamics at play in his iconic flower walls. Once again, Thompson casts himself at the centre of his artfully constructed floral profusions, which appear thick with symbolism and swirl with questions around Australian history, legal fictions, notions of nationhood and intersectional identities.

But where these fecund arrangements once cascaded in abundance, swallowing the figure and flattening the pictorial plane, here, they cloak the artist’s body like armour and throw him into arresting relief against otherwise minimal, boldly coloured backdrops.

A distinctly Bidjara form of rarrk recurs throughout the series, staying true to the style of the artist’s Country and people. Taking its title from the Bidjara word that loosely translates to ‘the other side’, Yabunbarru is a powerful statement of First Nations sovereignty and queer subjectivity.

We are excited to host the international debut of Yabunbarru by Dr Christian Thompson AO at Sydney Contemporary, open 5–8 September at Carriageworks.

To receive a preview and priority access to the series, please email danielsoma@michaelreid.com.au

At Sydney Contemporary, Michael Reid Sydney + Berlin will host the highly anticipated Australian debut of Species – a spectacular new series from leading contemporary artist, Magnum photographer and master in his field Trent Parke.

Photographs from Species have already garnered international acclaim after being shown at Milan Design Week in a touring exhibition specially commissioned by Magnum Photos and Veuve Clicquot. A centrepiece of the series has since been selected for Australia’s most prestigious photo-based media award, the William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize.

Captured through an extraordinary feat of endurance and technical wizardry, Species is a thrilling synthesis of Parke’s singular skill and aesthetic sensibilities. “Shooting directly into the sun, with what could be considered a telescope, is a challenge in itself,” says the artist, who lensed his subjects from a distance of 700 metres. “It was 1/2000th of a second, but three months in the making.”

The resulting pictures cast halcyon waterside scenes in a mythic light, with figures silhouetted against a monumental orb while leaping into glinting waters turned molten gold.

“The sun has always been a symbol of the great clock in the sky … the ultimate force of life,” says Parke, who, in 2007, became the first Australian inducted as a full member of Magnum Photos – a distinction he holds to this day.

The acute awareness of time that underpins his ultra-precise process rhymes beautifully with the air of nostalgia that breezes through his images, with the waning sun giving its final bursts of brilliance as swimmers seek ecstatic reprieve from the summer heat.

Parke sees Species as a meeting of two “symbols of universal energy” – the sun and the ocean melting together in a sumptuous pool of colour.

Sign up now to be the first to receive exclusive previews and priority access to this upcoming release before the art fair launches at Carriageworks this September.

For acquisition enquiries please email danielsoma@michaelreid.com.au

Michael Reid Sydney + Berlin will present a spectacular new series of photographs by award-winning artist Narelle Autio at the 2024 edition of Sydney Contemporary.

Titled The Eyes of Her, the artist’s latest series plunges the viewer into mesmerising underwater worlds where ethereal figures swim from the inky depths towards the surface via effervescent swells and sweeping undulations.

“[I’m interested in] how beautiful [the water and ocean] can be, but also the beauty and danger coming together in a transformative space,” says Autio in a recent ABC profile.

The ocean has been an enduring muse for Autio, whose dazzling return to underwater photography – a practice she has perfected over three decades – follows an acclaimed solo exhibition of never-before-seen images drawn from her archive.

That show’s deep dive into her past work – combined with the expanded possibilities of a newly acquired, much larger digital camera – has now informed a sublime new suite of dreamlike images that subtly gesture to the mythical associations between women and water.

“Across the world, folk tales regale us with stories of mermaids, selkies and water sprites,” says Autio, reflecting on the thematic currents that emerged, quite unexpectedly, through the making of her new photographs. “Otherworldly creatures enticing us into the sea.”

Autio’s practice is animated by a mix of extraordinary technical rigour and the serendipitous possibilities of her immersive process. “The jetty is packed and full of humanity,” says the artist, whose images seem tinged with nostalgic affection for endless summer days by the sea.

“[Jetty jumpers] are just having fun, doing good things and just living – by circumstance and happenstance, you get something beautiful.”

To receive an early preview and priority access to works from The Eyes of Her by Narelle Autio, please email danielsoma@michaelreid.com.au