Aboriginal Superheroes in Arles

While much attention has naturally been focused on London and the torrent of Emily Kngwarreye-related exhibitions surrounding her solo show at the Tate Modern, there’s a surprising focus on our First Nations across the Channel at the Rencontres d’Arles, one of the world’s most prestigious and longest running photography festivals. More than half of the exhibitors in ‘On Country: Photography from Australia’ – the first time there has ever been a regional focus on Australia at the Rencontres – are Indigenous.

It’s the work of PHOTO Australia, producers of the PHOTO International Festival of Photography in Melbourne, who have established a partnership with the Rencontres, and the work will be on show in Arles until 5 October 2025. The focus is curated by PHOTO Australia Founder/Artistic Director Elias Redstone, along with everywhere-woman Kimberley Moulton (Yorta Yorta), and in-house curators Pippa Milne and Brendan McCleary. ‘On Country: Photography from Australia’ highlights the depth and diversity of photographic practice in Australia to new international audiences through the work of 17 artists and collectives.

Over two hundred photographic works have been selected by the artists seeking to bear witness to both the visible and invisible aspects of being ‘on Country’ – a term embodied by First Peoples in Australia to describe the lands, waterways, seas and cosmos to which they are connected.

The Full List of Exhibiting Artists is:
• Tony Albert (Kuku Yalanji) & David Charles Collins
• Ying Ang
• Atong Atem
• Sonja Carmichael (Ngugi/Quandamooka) & Elisa Jane Carmichael (Ngugi/Quandamooka)
• Maree Clarke (Yorta Yorta/Wamba Wamba/Mutti Mutti/Boonwurrung)
• Michael Cook (Bidjara)
• Brenda L Croft (Gurindji/Malngin/Mudburra)
• J Davies
• Liss Fenwick
• Adam Ferguson
• Robert Fielding (Yankunytjatjara/Western Arrernte peoples)
• The Huxleys – Will Huxley & Garrett Huxley (Gumbaynggirr/Yorta Yorta)
• Ricky Maynard (Pakana)
• Lisa Sorgini
• Tace Stevens (Noongar/Spinifex)
• wani toaishara
• James Tylor (Kaurna)

Exhibition highlights include:

• Tony Albert & David Charles Collins’ series ‘Warakurna Superheroes’ – produced in collaboration with children from that remote community in WA dressing up as superheroes and posing against the dramatic outback landscapes. The artwork Warakurna Superheroes #1 has been selected by Festival Director Christoph Wiesner as the hero image for the 2025 festival.

• Capemba Bumbarra, a 38-metre cyanotype installation by Elisa Jane Carmichael & Sonja Carmichael (Ngugi/Quandamooka) representing the flow of fresh water from a spring as it flows through the bush, mangroves and out into the salty bay of Quandamooka on the Queensland Coast.

• A site specific installation by Maree Clarke of her series Ritual and Ceremony, including a 3-metre tall portrait of the distinguished Elder, the late Uncle Jack Charles.

• The exhibition takes place in the historic Eglise Saint-Anne – a deconsecrated church built in the 1600s – and will be a centrepiece exhibition visible to an estimated 160,000 visitors.

Accompanying the exhibition is the launch of ‘On Country: Photography from Australia’, a dedicated catalogue published by Melbourne-based Perimeter Editions. The publication offers further insight into the artists and their works, extending the exhibition’s reach beyond its physical space and creating a resource on Australian photographic practice now.

Elias Redstone, Curator, comments:
“’On Country: Photography from Australia’ is a significant moment for Australian photography, amplifying the depth and diversity of our artists on a prestigious global platform. This exhibition is the result of years of dedicated advocacy by PHOTO Australia to ensure Australian photographers are seen, heard and celebrated internationally”.

Christoph Wiesner, Director, Rencontres d’Arles:
“Bringing ‘On Country: Photography from Australia’ to Arles marks a monumental moment in the recognition of Australian photography on the world stage, and is certainly the most significant showing of Australian artists ever at our festival. This exhibition not only introduces international audiences to the breadth and complexity of contemporary Australian photographic practices but also creates a powerful dialogue on land, history, and identity that many European audiences may not be aware of. We are honoured to be the first to showcase such a significant body of work in Arles”.

Reporting on the exhibition, Stephen Todd in the AFR placed ‘On Country’ squarely at the heart of the Rencontres, quoting curator Elias Redstone as delighting, “There is such a buzz about the exhibition. International artists, curators and collectors have swarmed into town, and it’s thrilling to see and hear their reactions to the work. We operate in a bubble in Australia, whereas here there is a full ecosystem where art is being made, consumed, viewed and celebrated. It’s incredibly exciting to be a part of these more global conversations”.

Todd continues: “On posters and placemats in cafés, on banners strung across cobbled streets and on three-metre-high billboards is an image of an Indigenous boy dressed as a caped crusader brandishing a makeshift shield painted in Australian First Nations colours. Feet perched on the rusting carapace of an abandoned car, his bright red mask flaunts a yellow ‘A’: a riff off the Marvel character Captain America, subverted to suggest Captain Aboriginal. The image was shot in remote Western Australia almost a decade ago. Now chosen as the hero image of Les Rencontres d’Arles, the international photography festival, it is conquering the global art world’s imagination”.

Oddly, Tom Seymour, critiquing for the online Ocula magazine, failed to notice anything Australian!
“Beneath the Provençal sun and amid the Roman ruins and 19th-century ateliers, the message is unmistakable at this year’s Rencontres d’Arles: American photography is having a distinct moment. Nowhere can this shift be seen more than in the return of Nan Goldin as laureate of the 2025 Kering Women In Motion Award, with her latest body of work ‘Stendhal Syndrome’ (2024) anchoring the festival’s program. But this edition of Arles is not a showcase of American dominance. It is instead a meditation on the country’s internal divisions and fractures. The title of this year’s edition—Disobedient Images—points to photography’s unique ability to voice defiance. Whether in Goldin’s confrontation, Scarville’s mourning, Stettner’s empathy, or Markosian’s excavation of memory, American artists at Arles 2025 are probing the conditions of their own country and complicating its image abroad.

“As Christoph Wiesner, artistic director of Rencontres d’Arles, wrote in introduction to the festival: ‘Photography is envisioned as an instrument of resistance, testimony, and social transformation’”.

A fine selection of images from On Country has been published in The Guardian.

Pintupi-Luritja Lutheran Pastor Simon Dixon, Ikuntji/Haast Bluff, Arrernte Country, Northern Territory, 2023.  Adam Ferguson

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