Event and Ticketing Details
Dates & Times
Wednesday 09 July
6:15 PM - 7:15 PM
Emily Kam Kngwarray’s monumental artwork Big Yam Dreaming represents a central aspect of her cultural heritage.
The network of bold white lines on black, derived from women’s striped body paintings, suggests the roots of the pencil yam spreading beneath the ground — and the cracks in the ground created as it ripens.
Kngwarray’s country, Alhalker, is an important Anwerlarr (Pencil Yam) Dreaming site, the staple from which she takes her bush name, Kam (yam seed).
We’ll look at Aboriginal agriculture and land management, and the significance of yams – as food and cultural icon, in places as far-flung as Tonga and Central Australia.
Judith Ryan, senior curator of Indigenous Art at NGV, will talk about the artwork and place it in context.
Matt Preston, Masterchef’s resident food critic, will talk about true yams, finger yams, and the cultural importance of the yam in cultures such as Tonga and West Africa.
Indigenous writer Bruce Pascoe will talk about Aboriginal agriculture and land management.
Wurundjeri artist Mandy Nicholson will speak on the role of women in Aboriginal society, then and now.
Artist Clinton Nain will speak.
And author Ellen van Neerven will respond creatively to the work.
Australian Art Starting Conversations
Certain timeless works of art make us see the world differently. By experiencing famous paintings or sculptures, we can form an idea of what life was like when they were created.
But how much can iconic art teach us about the world today? Taking four historical works as a starting point, our guests make a series of lateral leaps to explore the diversity of the modern world through the prism of classic art.
After a curator from the National Gallery of Victoria places the work in context, five different speakers will explore the tangents that arise, leading the discussion surrounding the piece in new and unexpected directions. The evening concludes with a creative response directly inspired by the artwork itself.
In this instalment hosted by Michael Williams, guests – including food journalist and television personality Matt Preston, artists Mandy Nicholson and Clinton Nain, authors Bruce Pascoe and Ellen van Neerven, and the NGV’s senior curator of Indigenous Art, Judith Ryan – will present ideas, stories and observations inspired by Emily Kam Kngwarray’s Anwerlarr anganenty (Big Yam Dreaming).
Please enter through the North entrance, via Arts Centre Melbourne forecourt.
Presented by the Wheeler Centre and the NGV.
Featuring
Judith Ryan
Judith Ryan AM is Senior Curator of Indigenous Art at the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV). Judith received a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in Fine Arts and English Literature at The University of Melbourne and a Certificate in Education at Oxford University. In her role at the NGV she has curatorial responsibility for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art, Oceanic Art and Pre-Columbian Art. Judith's special interest is Indigenous Australian art of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Judith has curated numerous exhibitions of Indigenous art, has published widely in the field and has been responsible for developing the NGV’s collection of Indigenous Art.
Michael Williams
Michael Williams is the editor of The Monthly. He was previously the Artistic Director of Sydney Writers’ Festival. He has spent the past decade at the Wheeler Centre for Books, Writing and Ideas in Melbourne as its ...
Clinton Nain
Clinton Nain (G’ua G’ua and Meriam) is an artist. He was born in 1971 in Melbourne, Victoria and lives and works in Melbourne.
Clinton held his first solo exhibition in 1996 at Hogarth Galleries, Sydney.
He has since been represented in Blak City Culture, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne, 1994; Ilan Pasin (This Is Our Way): Torres Strait Art, Cairns Regional Gallery, 1998; Beyond the Pale, Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art, 2000; Land Marks, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 2006; and Power & Beauty: Indigenous Art Now, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne, 2007.
Mandy Nicholson
Mandy is a member of the Wurundjeri-willam clan of Melbourne and surrounds and currently lives in the South Eastern Suburbs. Mandy is a recognised artist, qualified Archaeologist and leader of the Djirri Djirri Dance Group. Mandy has been working at the Victorian Aboriginal Corporation for Languages since 2012 supporting language projects, school programs and communities in the revival of their languages.
Matt Preston
Matt Preston is an award-winning food journalist, restaurant critic and television personality. Best known as a judge and co-host of MasterChef Australia, Preston is also a senior editor for delicious and taste magazine.
Preston has now appeared in six series of the ratings success MasterChef series, as well as one series each of Celebrity MasterChef, Junior MasterChef and MasterChef Allstars. In 2013, he hosted the newest series in the franchise, MasterChef: The Professionals with Marco Pierre White, which was named Australia’s Best Reality Show in this year’s AACTA Awards.
MasterChef Australia and its Australian variants are shown in over 170 countries around the world – from Venezuela and the Philippines to the Sudan, the UK and Scandinavia. With a total worldwide audience of over 180 million viewers, MasterChef Australia is also the highest rating English speaking program in India – with over 3 million viewers making Matt, George and Gary stars on the sub-continent.
Matt writes a national column for the Taste section of all News Ltd metropolitan papers. He is active on social media, and has a highly involved following of 170,000 fans on both Facebook and Twitter. He is also a keen tennis player … but due to an extreme lack of talent, he is extremely unlikely to ever win a wild card slot for the Australian Open.
Ellen van Neerven
Ellen van Neerven is an award-winning writer of Mununjali Yugambeh (South East Queensland) and Dutch heritage. They write fiction, poetry, plays and non-fiction. Ellen’s first book, Heat and Light, was the recipient of the David Unaipon Award ...
Bruce Pascoe
Bruce Pascoe is a Yuin, Bunurong and Tasmanian man born in the Melbourne suburb of Richmond. He’s the author of the best-selling Dark Emu, Young Dark Emu: A Truer History, Loving Country: A Guide to Sacred Australia ...