Join us at Samstag to enjoy a conversation between Marri Ngarr artist Ryan Presley and Associate Professor Andrea Bubenik as they discuss the practice of ‘art making as reckoning’.

Samstag presents Ryan Presley: Daydreamer, a selection of works by Marri Ngarr artist Ryan Presley. Presley’s figurative paintings weave personal and cultural motifs with art historical references to evoke First Nations narratives of strength, sovereignty and survival. Interrogating the conventions of Western art and religious iconography, Presley subverts colonial forms of representation to foreground the lived experiences of contemporary Aboriginal peoples. Densely layered with symbolic meaning and rich visual imagery, Presley’s work is a bold commentary on the state of power and oppression in ‘post-colonial’ Australia.

Dr Andrea Bubenik is an Associate Professor in Art History in the School of Communication and Arts at the University of Queensland. She is an expert in Renaissance and Baroque Art, and the continued reception of early modern visual culture.

TALK/

Saturday 18 October

2-3 pm

Samstag Museum of Art

Free admission. All welcome.

Image: Ryan Presley, Lucid dream (The fair game), (detail), 2024. Image courtesy the Artist and Milani Gallery, Meanjin, Brisbane. Photograph by Carl Warner.

Contact the host of Ryan Presley in conversation with Andrea Bubenik