Learn more about New York-based artist Duke Riley’s practice during this drop-in film screening and hands-on frottage activation. Duke’s short film Echelon of Uncertainty (2022) will be on view, accompanying the artist’s selected works featured in Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik (Legends from the deep sitting peacefully on the waters) – Selected works from the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rīvus.

Echelon of Uncertainty follows a live-oard boat community that has called the Newtown Creek area home since 2003. Despite the unknown health effects of living atop a site contaminated by more than a century’s worth of industrial pollution, these individuals persist due to the complex impacts of gentrification on their lives and the community this place offers.

A frottage station will accompany the film for viewers to experience the materiality and form of Duke’s related sandstone work Rune of Ruin (2021). In this hands on activity, you will create your own artwork to take home by making a rubbing of the artwork surface using paper and a variety of 2D media.

COVID-19 Advice

The IMA strongly encourages mask-wearing onsite in the galleries and for events to keep our community safe. If you are displaying symptoms of COVID-19 or are feeling unwell, please stay home. ⁠

Accessibility

We are committed to making the IMA accessible to people of all abilities, their families, and carers, as well as visitors of different ages and different backgrounds.

The gallery entrance is on the ground floor of the Judith Wright Arts Centre, on Berwick Street. There is wheelchair access and an accessible toilet with baby changing facilities also located on the ground floor, and we welcome guide and support dogs.

To find out more, contact us at ima@ima.org.au, call (07) 3252 5750, or ask our friendly staff on-site. Read our access information for visitors here.

Artist Biography

Duke Riley’s work addresses the tension between individual and collective behaviour, independent spaces within all-encompassing societies, and the conflict with institutional power. He examines transgression zones and their inhabitants through drawing, printmaking, mosaic, sculpture, performative interventions, infiltrations, and video structured as complex multimedia installations. Duke combines populist myths and historical obscurities with contemporary social and environmental dilemmas, connecting past and present, drawing attention to unsolved issues. Throughout his projects he profiles the space where water meets the land, traditionally marking the periphery of urban society, what lies beyond rigid moral constructs, a sense of danger and possibility.