Art Almanac July 2025

Cultural resilience, identity, and memory feature heavily throughout this issue, introduced by our cover image, Jennifer Herd’s Dislocation Reclamation, 2025, part of the artist’s solo exhibition, Off Country, at FireWorks Gallery, Brisbane. Herd, a Mbararrum woman whose family roots lie in far-north Queensland, creates new work reflecting her own experiences of displacement, resilience, and identity erasure, while celebrating community and cultural reconnection. In several works, a new motif, the map of Australia, is described as “a defiant truth: despite colonisation, Aboriginal peoples remain – resisting, reclaiming, and enduring on their land.” Works by other artists exhibiting this month are woven together by threads of cultural traditions, family and community, shared lived experiences, and the beauty and fragility of the human condition, as well as experimentation and play of medium.…

National Museum of Australia 4 July to 13 October 2025 Australian Capital Territory This exhibition offers visitors an up-close and personal encounter with the beloved puppet with a pencil for a nose, Mr Squiggle, ‘the man from the moon’, who starred in the ABC TV show bearing his name from 1959 to 1999. With a gentle personality, a sense of wonder and an expansive and unconstrained imagination, he transformed simple “upside down” squiggles submitted by children across Australia into masterpieces; with his puppeteer – artist and cartoonist Norman Hetherington – completing over 10,000 drawings over the show’s forty-year run. The exhibition showcases more than 300 objects drawn from the National Museum’s recently acquired Norman Hetherington collection. With characters including Blackboard, Rocket, Bill Steamshovel, and Gus the Snail, Mr Squiggle and…

Cairns Indigenous Art Fair From 10 to 13 July, the annual Cairns Indigenous Art Fair celebrates its sixteenth edition, returning to the Tanks Art Centre in the city’s botanical arts precinct – where the fair began. Comprising over 600 visual artists and 150 performers, in addition to an art showcase and fashion performances, this year’s program includes awards, cultural demonstrations, food, masterclasses, and talks. The 2025 theme is ‘Pay Attention!’ – inspired by Tony Albert’s 2011 print work of the same name. The theme is a call to action for artists to reflect on this moment in our collective history, following the 2023 Voice referendum – a challenge to remain vigilant about the cultural, political and social issues impacting First Nations communities today. Art Fair Showcase, Fashion Performances, and Talks…

“… the power of awakening to wonder.” “Wonder doesn’t reside in an object or natural phenomena, it happens within us, at the moment of interaction with these things, if we remain open, stop and notice,” co-curators Tamsin Cull and Laura Mudge tell me about Wonderstruck; many of the works on show that they describe as “visually spectacular and experiential, encouraging the audience to view the work from different angles, and some invite audiences to participate, to get hands on and express their creativity.” Drawn from the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art’s (QAGOMA) collection, featured here are more than 100 works and interactive projects by over seventy artists, the curators calling it “a collection show with a difference.” Developed “rapidly” over ten months, it includes recontextualised interactive projects…

“… an elegant dialogue between form, shadow, and colour.” At the heart of Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula, Moorooduc has maintained a rugged pastoral charm that contrasts sharply with the surrounding landscape of vineyards and increasingly developed towns. Amidst this landscape, sculptural artist Ben Sheers has established his workshop in a sprawling shed, nestled within a setting that is both tranquil and evocative – dissected by flight paths of birds and perched at the threshold of open paddocks and home. His studio life exemplifies disciplined exploration and refined craftsmanship, where each act of creation is both contemplative and deliberate, rooted in a rigorous process that marries aesthetic intuition with meticulous technique. Sheers’ artistic practice centres on minimalist sculpture, an artform that fosters an elegant dialogue between form, shadow, and colour. His works…

Wangaratta Art Gallery Until 20 July 2025 Victoria Fiona Currey-Billyard often explores the nature of memory and the capacity of materials to capture the resonance of cultural, historical and natural events. Such explorations continue here with deeply personal memories of people and places. Materials include hair, nails, staples and tobacco sourced from specific locations combined with textiles and paper. A standout work pays tribute to her late mother, also a textile artist. Created using associated items such as rich blue velvet and her mother’s sketches and plans, it is both a continuation and a conversation between generations.…