I was honoured to write a feature review for ‘The Light Of Day‘, the world class retrospective of Yhonnie Scarce’s artworks currently showing at The Art Gallery of WA. The review was in the March 2nd issue of the Saturday Paper, or subscribers can read it online here.

Scarce’s glass artworks of bush plums, bush bananas and yams are meditative points to consider kinship, colonisation, and nuclear testing in remote South Australia. Scarce is a Kokotha and Nukunu artist with ties to communities impacted by the British nuclear tests allowed by the Australian Government in the 1950’s and 1960’s. There are also photographic, fabric, and ceramic works that anchor the works to place and people.

I couldn’t believe it when I heard that we were getting a retrospective here in Perth of Yhonnie’s artworks, it’s a dream come true. ‘The Light Of Day’ is a world class exhibition, curated by Clothilde Bullen, open until 19th of May. It warrants many visits to explore the nuclear cloud chandeliers, glowing uranium glassware, glass offerings to ancestors and many more.

There is a lot of buzz around all the Oscars that Nolan’s Oppenheimer just won, but Yhonnie’s body of work is a powerful perspective on nuclear horrors that’s a lot closer to home. I’ve also been reading the beautiful exhibition monograph put together by AGWA, which is for sale at the gallery shop. So amazing to see Yhonnie’s incredible career to date.