Celebrating the new NGV publication Photography: Real and Imagined and the accompanying exhibition, NGV curators join guest authors to reflect on the complex, engaging and sometimes contradictory nature of all things photographic.
Taking a closer look at photographic works in the NGV Collection and unpacking the themes explored in the publication, join us as we delve into the work of Australian and international photographers and artists from the nineteenth through to the twenty-first century.
NGV Members enjoy discounted pricing on the publication. Pre-purchase your copy with your program ticket, or buy a copy on the night.
Speakers
Sophia Cai 蔡晨昕 is a curator and arts writer based in Naarm/Melbourne, Australia. She currently teaches at the University of Melbourne and Monash Art, Design and Architecture, while maintaining an independent curating and writing practice. Sophia is particularly interested in Asian art histories, the intersections between contemporary art and craft, and feminist curatorial methodologies and community-building as forms of political resistance.
Patrick Pound is an artist and writer on photography. He is presently working on texts regarding photography and literature, and several books working with found photography. His artworks have been exhibited widely, including as part of Susan Bright’s PHotoESPAÑA 2019, Museo Lázaro Galdiano, Madrid; David Campany’s The Lives and Loves of Images at the Kunsthalle Mannheim (2020); and A Trillion Sunsets: A Century of Image Overload at the International Center of Photography, New York (2022). Patrick’s 2017 National Gallery of Victoria survey was curated by Maggie Finch. He has an art history PhD from the University of Melbourne.
Dr Kyla McFarlane is a curator and writer from Aotearoa/New Zealand, living and working in Naarm/ Melbourne. She is currently Academic Engagement Manager in the Museums and Collections Department at the University of Melbourne, where she connects academics and students from all faculties with the exhibitions, collections and programs in the university’s art museums. Kyla has held key curatorial positions at the Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane and at Melbourne’s Centre for Contemporary Photography and Monash University Museum of Art. Over two decades, her curating and art writing has focused primarily on lens-based, feminist, performative and emerging art practices in her region.
Susan van Wyk is Senior Curator of Photography at the NGV. Since joining the NGV in 1989, she has worked on more than sixty exhibitions of Australian and international photography. Recent exhibitions include Olympia: Photographs by Polixeni Papapetrou (2019), Turning Points: Contemporary Photography from China (2019), Colony: Australia 1770–1861 (2018) and Henry Talbot: 1960s Fashion Photography (2016). Over her career she has published widely on photography in books, exhibition catalogues and in numerous journals and magazines.
Maggie Finch is Curator of Photography at the National Gallery of Victoria. She joined the department in 2006 and has curated numerous exhibitions at the NGV, including Darren Sylvester: Carve a Future, Devour Everything, Become Something (2019), Patrick Pound: The Great Exhibition (2017), Transmission: Legacies of the Television Age (2015) and Sue Ford (2014), and was a contributing curator for Melbourne Now (2013 and 2023). Maggie has written on contemporary, twentieth-century and historical photography, exhibitions and artists.
Moderator
Megan Patty is Head of Publications, Photographic Services and Library at the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia, and is founding Curator of the Melbourne Art Book Fair (est.2015). She is a Publisher, writer and researcher and has edited numerous publications including Art Writing In Crisis, (2021), She Persists: Perspectives on Women in Art & Design, 2020, The Centre: On Art & Urbanism in China (2019); Some Posters from the NGV (2018), and NGV Triennial (2017). She is PhD candidate, RMIT University, Melbourne.