We invite you to join us for a conversation between
curator Liz Nowell and artist Gordon Hookey.

Liz and Gordon will share insights into the development of A MURRIALITY and discuss the concepts Gordon's creative practice. They will also explore the collaboration and cross-cultural relationships between the artist and curator.

Saturday, 2 August
11:00 am – 12:00 pm

Plimsoll Gallery
37 Hunter Street, nipaluna / Hobart

This event is free and open to all, including students, staff,
and members of the wider community. A Q&A session will be held afterward
to provide the audience with a chance to ask questions.

Gordon Hookey was born in Cloncurry, Queensland in 1961. He currently lives and works in Brisbane. Hookey belongs to the Waanyi people and locates his art at the interface where Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal cultures converge.

He explicitly attacks the establishment and implicates our current political representatives. His style and approach is distinctive in its vibrancy and best known for its biting satire of Australia’s political landscape, its leaders and representatives. Hookey's work combines figurative characters, iconic symbols, bold comic-like text, and a spectrum of vibrant colours. Through this idiosyncratic visual language he has developed a unique and immediately recognisable style. Hookey’s perspective comes from a divergent, activist positioning – his work challenges hierarchies, skewering the status and integrity of the ‘elite’, while working to bolster the position of the marginalised and oppressed. Hookey is a core member of Brisbane-based Indigenous collective proppaNOW alongside fellow artists including Richard Bell, Vernon Ah Kee and Jennifer Herd. His work is held in major collections within Australia including the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art and University of Queensland Art Museum in Brisbane in Brisbane, Art Gallery of Western Australia in Perth, National Gallery of Australia and Australian National University in Canberra, National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, University of Technology in Sydney and a number of significant private collections.

Gordon Hookey is represented by Milani Gallery, Brisbane.

Liz Nowell is a curator and cultural leader whose practice is informed by collaboration, relationality, and care ethics. Since 2023 she has served as the Executive Director of Arts Project Australia, a leading visual arts organisation that supports neurodivergent artists and champions their inclusion in the contemporary art sector. Currently, she is co-Chair of the National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA).

Across her two-decade career, which spans both Australian and international contemporary art, Liz has led preeminent public galleries and cultural organisations including the Institute of Modern Art, Adelaide Contemporary Experimental (of which she was founding Director), and the Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia. She is also an Australian Progress Fellow and a 2023 alumnus of the International Studio and Curatorial Program in New York. Liz's notable curatorial projects include Rainbow Serpent (Version): Daniel Boyd (IMA, Brisbane), Yhonnie Scarce: Missile Park (co-curator, IMA, Brisbane and Australia Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne), Making Art Work (IMA, Brisbane), Songs for a Room: Gerry Wedd (ACE, Adelaide), CREATURE: Marianna Simnett (co-curator, IMA, Brisbane and City Gallery Wellington), and Next Matriarch (co-curated with Kimberley Moulton, ACE, Adelaide and Koori Heritage Trust, Melbourne).

As an author and editor, Liz has written for publishers including Phaidon, Art Gallery of South Australia, National Gallery of Australia, Museum of Contemporary Art, Art Monthly and Art + Australia. In 2022 she co-edited This language that is every stone alongside Hans Ulrich Obrist, Asad Raza, Olivia Fairweather, and Warraba Weatherall (published by the IMA and Koenig Books).

Gordon Hookey: A MURRIALITY is the first survey of renowned Waanyi artist Gordon Hookey, charting three decades of practice where artmaking and activism fuse. Drawn from public collections as well as the artist’s own studio archive, this exhibition features over fifteen key works, presented alongside a major new commission of eight protest-style banners.

Charting his practice from the early 1990s until the present day, A MURRIALITY reveals an artist reckoning with the legacies of capital and empire. With biting wit and candour, Gordon’s work addresses issues including land rights, environmental destruction, institutional violence, human rights abuses, systemic racism, police corruption and international conflict.

Across large-scale painting, sculpture, video, print making and even a children’s book, Gordon reconstructs world histories and current affairs through the lens of his lived experience. In his trademark visual language, anthropomorphic kangaroos play out fantastical allegories, claiming victory over introduced species such as cane toads, camels, and, of course, pigs.

Superimposed over these frenetic tableaus is slang, text and political jargon that the artist has deliberately misspelt, disassembled and bastardised. For Gordy, whose mother tongue was taken from him in the process of colonisation, exploiting English vernacular is an act of Indigenisation and resistance.

In addition to previous works, A MURRIALITY features a significant commission that draws inspiration from Hookey’s vast collection of political posters and continues his acclaimed series of protest banners. Made for use in the public realm at Invasion Day marches and rallies recognising Aboriginal resistance fighter Dundalli, Hookey’s banners provide timely socio-political commentary while also imagining a truly empowered Indigenous future.

Curators: José Da Silva and Liz Nowell

GALLERY Opening 
17 June – 16 August 
11am – 4pm Tuesdays – Saturdays
Closed Sundays, Mondays, and public holidays

A Murriality was developed in a partnership with the Institute of Modern Art, Meanjin/Brisbane, and UNSW Galleries, Gadigal/Sydney. Presented with the support of the Australia Council for the Arts, Gordon Darling Foundation, IMA Commissioners Circle and UNSW Commissioners Circle. Its national tour is supported by the Australian Government’s Visions of Australia and by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.

_{Image credits (top to bottom): Installation View: Gordon Hookey : A MURRIALITY 2025, Plimsoll Gallery, University of Tasmania. A Murriality was developed in a partnership with the Institute of Modern Art, Meanjin/Brisbane, and UNSW Galleries, Gadigal/Sydney. Photo: Cassie Sullivan. GORDY studio, Photo: Rhett Hammerton, and Liz Nowell, Photo: Natalie Piserchio}