This exhibition attempts to showcase works of art that reflect the depth of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art and culture, with other aspects of the Aboriginal condition. As a result, radical observations about the ups and downs of life will, at times, weave in and out of stories about Country. Equally, across the show, visitors will encounter passages of serenity, corridors of tradition, and trails that speak to the upheavals experienced by generations of Indigenous people. Balancing Act features the work of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists living and working across the State and Australia. Works of art by local Noongar artists such as Revel Cooper (dec.), Sandra Hill, Dianne Jones and Shane Pickett (dec.) sit loud-and-proud among those by Richard Bell, Karla Dickens, Julie Dowling and Brian Robinson to name a few of the many stellar artists in the show. Image - Richard Bell One more hour of daylight 2017-2019. Synthetic polymer paint on linen, three parts: 240 x 540 cm (overall). State Art Collection, Art Gallery of Western Australia. Purchased through the Art Gallery of Western Australia Foundation: TomorrowFund, 2019. © Richard Bell, courtesy Milani Gallery, Brisbane.

Alex Martinis Roe sets out to explore feminist, lesbian and queer kinship structures via a non-linear genealogy of the artist’s own kin. Alex Martinis Roe explores feminist genealogies and seeks to foster specific and productive relationships between different generations as a way of participating in the construction of feminist histories and futures. This involves developing research and storytelling methodologies that employ non-linear understandings of time, respond to the specific practices of different communities, experiment with the set-up of discursive encounters and imagine how these entanglements can inform new political practices. 

Conceived for the central gallery space at PICA, Amy Perejuan-Capone presents a new body of work including sculpture, video and installation, using the dramatic height of the gallery for the presentation of historical hang gliders. Perejuan-Capone‘s practice is underpinned by an enquiry into the systems of exchange that are present through the acquisition and application of craft. Across broad mediums including ceramics, textiles and metalworks, she seeks to understand objects, materials and the networks of social and cultural agency held within them. Present in her work, which often take form as large scale sculptural installations, are the interconnected systems of environment, production, labour and personal and social histories.