Celebrating a landmark anniversary, the Tenth Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT10) looks optimistically to the future. Curated by a team from the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG) and Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) (together, QAGOMA) with various regional collaborators, it addresses the recent tumult of border closures, climate crises, and international and local conflicts with sites of connection both real and imagined. The Triennial occupies spaces of varying scales across multiple floors of QAGOMA in Meanjin (Brisbane),^[01] 01. Meanjin is a Turrbal word used to describe the land where Brisbane is located. QAGOMA is situated on the lands of the Turrbal and Yuggera (also spelled Jagera) people – Aboriginal groups who are the traditional land owners. Australia. It features over 150 participants from 30 countries who represent diverse, ambitious practices across the Asia Pacific and its diasporas. 

Artists from Aotearoa have been an APT fixture, featuring in every edition since the first in 1993. This iteration is no exception. Of the 69 projects, six are by practitioners from Aotearoa—artists Edith Amituanai, Brian Fuata, Christina Pataialii, Shannon Novak and Shannon Te Ao (Ngāti Tūwharetoa) and the collaborative project Kā Paroro o Haumumu: Coastal Flows / Coastal Incursions. Alongside their ties to Aotearoa, many practitioners have other personal and transcultural connections that extend across and beyond the region. Alongside these participants, Auckland-based curator and artist Natasha Matila-Smith (Ngāti Kahungunu, Ngāti Hine, Sāmoan, Pākehā) took part in the inaugural Creative New Zealand Pacific Curator Residency in Australia. Matila-Smith worked with QAGOMA’s team to develop the exhibition, opening up new opportunities to shape how Aotearoa and its artists are represented in the Triennial. 

As with earlier iterations, this APT is not tethered to a central theme. Yet shared regional preoccupations emerge around creative practice and social and political conditions. Over time, conceptual threads across Triennials also reveal shifts in Australia’s Western soft diplomacy priorities and understanding of itself within the region.

This APT’s most notable presentations cast visions of an Indigenous-led future guided by symbiotic care of culture, people and the environment. A new three-channel film, Ia rā, ia rā (rere runga, rere raro) Everyday (I fly high, I fly low), 2021, by Shannon Te Ao shows intimate snapshots of bodies—hands, limbs, torsos—blurring like spectral forces untethered from place and time. The work draws upon the Māori guiding principle, ka mua ka muri, meaning to “walk backwards into the future”. Here, time is governed by a Māori worldview that Te Ao says exists, “along a continuum where past, present and future coexist”.^[02] 02. Shannon Te Ao, artist text, The 10th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, exhibition catalogue, Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, 2021, p. 159. Landscapes, figures and forms blend into monochromatic scenes, soundtracked by the song Tīwakawaka, performed in te reo (Māori Language). The artist makes manifest te reo and waiata (song) as important repositories of knowledge and culture connecting natural, physical and spiritual worlds across generations. 

Other standout works include Suggoo Pennise, 2021, by Meriam Mir artists Grace Lillian Lee and Uncle Ken Thaiday Snr, a large-scale sculpture of a Dhari (headdress) suspended from the GOMA ceiling. The Dhari is a potent symbol of Torres Strait Islander peoples and appears on their flag. Like a portal to another time, its concentric forms orbit above a mirrored platform and capture flashes of nearby pandanus tepo (mats) by Bajau Sama Dilaut Weavers. Elsewhere, two mural-style canvases titled MURRILAND!, 2017–ongoing, by Gordon Hookey (Waanyi) rewrite colonial Australian history using a vivid palette and wry humour, paintings by Mayur and Tushar Vayeda (Warli) of India transform cow dung and cloth into spirit constellations from ancient Warli narratives, and a hypnotic science-fiction film by Subash Thebe Limbu (Yakthung) of Nepal follows two Indigenous time travellers. These perspectives signal a necessary reckoning with the ongoing violence and cultural theft perpetrated against Indigenous communities.

Other emergent themes include collective practice, movement and migration, sites of ritual, and the politics of public and private space. Many converge in works by Wellington-born, Sydney-based artist Brian Fuata, who turned the QAG galleries into his studio as an invited artist-in-residence. In the year leading up to APT10, Fuata developed works for two dedicated ‘Open Studio’ spaces through research, on-site learning, and interactions with gallery staff. The resulting installations extend the artist’s improvised performance practice into a new “space of object-making,”^[03] 03. All quotes from Brian Fuata, conversation with the author, 16 February 2022. and yet remain steeped in his long-standing interest in the theatrical and improvised.

In site-specific installation Errantucation (mist opportunities), 2021, three projectors sit atop boxes and trolleys in a minimal, all-white space. They transmit films of Fuata’s performances, or “ghost improvisations” in which the artist interacts with objects in his vicinity at QAG during the often-unseen installation period. To one side of the room, a white sheet hangs between two sculptural lamps, their bases built using the same concrete aggregate as the building. Both lamps are mounted in timber crates that invert original sculpture moulds of Leonard and Kathleen Shillam’s bronze Pelicans, 1938, in the nearby Water Mall. The spatial austerity forms a stage—a blank sheet—upon which narratives, readings and texts might be projected. “The stage is the chaos agent of the performer”, Fuata says. The ghost is a recurring figure in his practice that signifies “absent presence”, and here haunts space as the “resonance of energy having left”.

In a smaller space adjacent, vitrines hold works by the artist responding to QAGOMA’s archives. Fuata observed how artists typically used the ‘Open Studio’ spaces and wanted to do something different. After studying APT and QAGOMA archives, with a focus on Fluxus, Pasifika and performance-based works, he chose eight images to digitally collage into a series of postcards. The artist describes them as, “a moodboard of my practice”, that takes “poetic licence in referencing art history”. A photocopied page from a Robert MacPherson artist book is suspended in another vitrine. Hands appear across these works but feel distant or disembodied like dissipating breath, reminding us of the archive’s haunting presence.

Fuata spoke of the “choreography of being in public space” and the intricacies of navigating this during a pandemic. This idea surfaces in his works, which unpack notions of both physical and institutional choreography. “I had to spirit these objects with a different logic of organisation and fabrication that wasn’t coming from a visual art canonical space”, he said, “but from a fumbling performance space that actually relies on kinetic, relational, poetic logics and a persona of, dare I say, cosplay”. In taking cues from QAGOMA’s past and present, Fuata’s works playfully move between the visible and invisible. His subtle yet deeply-considered gestures accumulate to unveil nuanced interactions between people and place. They might take a few moments to emerge from the minimal aesthetic, but those who look closely will encounter new meaning within the concealed and overlooked. 

Wellington-based Christina Pataialii also toys with space in a series of abstract paintings, titled Hard Day’s Night, 2021. They unsettle the environments we inhabit—whether aesthetic or conceptual, cultural or physical. Peach and umber smears meet monochromic and earthy tones across the artist’s ten dynamic compositions. Pataialii’s gestures are keenly felt, with each work teetering between motion and stillness. Made from acrylic and house paint on drop cloths, her works harmonise with Sumakshi Singh’s nearby embroideries, titled Afterlife, 2020–21. Singh recreates architectural features from her grandparents’ Delhi home as delicate, web-like windows of white, blue, black and red thread. Both artists’ works are presented across structures resembling rooms of a house, at once tracing and destabilising the spaces they occupy.

There is similar spatial dynamism in Tāmaki Makaurau-based Shannon Novak’s Make Visible project, realised with local LGBTIQA+^[04] 04. LGBTIQA+ is an evolving acronym that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer or questioning, asexual. The plus sign represents other terms people use to describe their gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, and/or sex characteristics. Other terms for the community include rainbow, queer, and variations on the LGBTQIA+ acronym. groups in Queensland. He describes the project’s core goal as, “to grow support for the LGBTQI+ community worldwide by making visible challenges and triumphs for this community”.^[05] 05. All quotes from Shannon Novak, conversations and email exchanges with the author, February–March 2022. Novak begins projects by establishing an understanding of place through research, connection-building and discussions. For APT10 this was facilitated by virtual platforms and on-the-ground support from QAGOMA staff over months, and, in some cases, years. 

This local engagement is reflected in Novak’s multifaceted approach for APT10. 81 Percent (Australia): Someone you know (from ‘'Make Visible: Queensland’'), 2021, is a large, site-specific vinyl installation. It transforms GOMA’s expansive ground floor windows into a kaleidoscopic field, bathing audiences and city views in pattern and colour. On an adjacent wall, 81 Percent (Australia): For the Voiceless (from '‘Make Visible: Queensland’'), 2021, is a patchwork of  vibrant artificial roses representing individuals who feel voiceless or unable to publicly identify as LGBTIQA+. Together these works use 81 surfaces, referencing a 2021 study on Australian LGBTIQA+ youth that found 81% of participants experienced “high or very high levels of psychological distress”.^[06] 06. In 2021, The Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health, and Society (ARCSHS) at La Trobe University released Writing Themselves In 4. This report shows findings from a 2019 survey on the health and wellbeing of LGBTQA+ people aged 14-21 in Australia. www.latrobe.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/1198945/Writing-Themselves-In-4-National-report.pdf   

Novak also led a suite of activations within and beyond the exhibition space. They include a collaborative work with QAGOMA’s Children’s Art Centre, interactive digital works, a video developed with local students, satellite billboards, public programs, workshops, and performances by the Brisbane Pride Choir. “I’m looking to reach the widest audience possible to increase the chances of growing support for LGBTQI+ people”, Novak explained. 

Speaking with Novak highlights how his creative work fuses with activism. “Activism is integral”, he explained. “The work supports the activism and vice versa”. Novak has even adapted his working schedule to international time zones to ensure he is present for his global community—whether this involves “supporting someone from the LGBTQI+ community in Uganda who needs urgent help at 1am, helping parents combat challenges at US schools around gender identity and expression, or developing an installation for QAGOMA”.

The artist’s work will not conclude with the closure of APT10. QAGOMA has signed up to the Safe Space Alliance, an organisation Novak founded to create safe spaces for LGBTIQA+ people globally. His ongoing work with QAGOMA will include policy changes, staff education and increasing the presence and engagement of the rainbow community through exhibitions and collections. These ambitious institutional changes and community-centred initiatives are perhaps Novak’s most compelling APT10 contribution. Although promoted in the artist’s installations, it would be interesting to see these elements given greater presence within the gallery. This could further institutional commitment and accountability, elevating the impact of Novak’s physical works. 

Kā Paroro o Haumumu: Coastal Flows / Coastal Incursions, 2012–ongoing, also advances institutional change through initiatives within and beyond the gallery. The work is developed by Alex Monteith, Vicki Lenihan (Waitaha, Kāti Māmoe, Kāi Tahu), the Kāi Tahu group Kaihaukai Art Collective led by Ron Bull Jnr (Kāti Te Ākau) and Simon Kaan (Kāi Tahu, Kāti Mamoe, Waitaha, Kāti Irakehu, Kāti Mako), Gerard O’Regan, and various collaborators. The presentation here expands this transdisciplinary project’s research into material^[07] 07. The materials, removed by archaeologist Peter Coutts between 1968 and 1972, were not inventoried at the time due to their complexity and quantity. Some materials found in these collections, and connected with through this project, include midden and other samples of fragments of kai (food), weavings and clothing, and matika and matapatete (fishhooks and bone fishhook points). removed from Te Mimi o Tū Te Rakiwhānoa (Fiordland) coastal and marine sites in Te Waipounamu (Aotearoa's South Island) and today held by several institutions.^[08] 08. The Southland Museum and Art Gallery Nigo o Te Taniwha (SMAG), the Otago Museum (OM), and Hocken Collections Uare Taoka o Hākena.  It was developed with a breadth of collaborators in Aotearoa and Australia including educators, artists, First Nations chefs, Elders and cultural experts from Kāi Tahu whānui. At GOMA the project unfolds in three parts across consecutive rooms—video documentation of trans-Indigenous food exchange accompanied by an installation of food traces, images and live-streams of institutional inventory work, and a multi-channel video essay. The project continues comprehensive efforts to indigenise museological practices through iwi-led (kinship group-led) knowledge-sharing and cultural ownership. Yet, this presentation feels oddly distant from the Indigenous communities at the heart of the project. The small, darkened rooms were overladen with information in contrast to the expansive space showcasing Suggoo Pennise outside. It can be difficult to represent research-based projects in a gallery environment, but this attempt feels didactic and difficult to connect with. 

In contrast, Edith Amituanai’s works at QAG are captivating, intimate snapshots of her community that explore experiences of migration and place. The series of five printed stills and the artist’s first film, La’u Pele Moana (My darling Moana), 2021, captures feelings of distance, transience and longing. Her images offer sites of connection for under-represented communities across the Tasman, including Pasifika, migrants and youth. 

Amituanai regularly draws on an extended network of family, friends and people she meets online to become co-creators, rather than subjects. “I’m not the only expert here”, Amituanai says.^[09] 09. All quotes from Edith Amituanai, in conversation with the author, 11 February 2022. “I’m relying on the knowledge and skill of people in front of the camera. I think of it as a shared knowledge, practice or experience”. Hoping to develop these works with Queensland-based communities and friends, she turned instead to her West Auckland neighbourhood when the pandemic prohibited travel. Many Sāmoan families, including Amituanai’s, relocate to Aotearoa, and see Australia as the next step. 

She describes the resulting works as “visual postcards” to loved ones missed. Each conjures aspirations and narratives of migration, both voluntary and forced. Two photographs show young men—swimming in the green water of an abandoned quarry, or riding a siren bike alone while gazing across the water. Other prints on silk—chosen for its movement and transportability—have the haziness of distant memories, or projections of a place. The lens finds palm trees and foaming waves, a giant bubble catching the bruise-coloured hues of sunset, and a tattoo on the back of a “501”—one of a growing number of deportees sent to Aotearoa on “character grounds” under Australia’s hardline immigration policy.^[10] 10. The term “501s” comes from section 501 of Australia’s Migration Act, which allows the Minister for Immigration to deport a resident “on character grounds”. This section was amended in 2014 and has since been used to deport individuals to Aotearoa, including for only minor offences and even if the individual has little to no connection to Aotearoa. This practice has been criticised widely, including for separating families and disproportionately affecting people of Māori or Pacific descent. www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/when-is-a-new-zealander-actually-an-australian/ Hopes of the “land of milk and honey” are tempered by more despondent realities that speak to imbalanced power dynamics between these countries. “I love the power of visibility that the camera can provide”, says Amituanai. “I know it has been used for evil, but I believe it can be used to uplift, change a view, or provide a perspective that hasn’t been seen, or hasn’t been seen enough”.

Amituanai’s film incorporates similar imagery. Here, slow motion vignettes of daily life merge with idyllic beach scenes like a foggy dream. The title references Pele Moana, a popular 1980s Sāmoan love song by the Golden Ali’is that also soundtracks Amituanai’s film. Translating to “Darling Moana”, in Sāmoan, this phrase can refer to both a woman named Moana or the Pacific Ocean. “I was interested in this ocean that separates and connects us”, says Amituanai. One scene shows her niece wearing an “Always Was Always Will Be” t-shirt, asserting Aboriginal Sovereignty, but the eucalypt-lined park in the background is in West Auckland. Through visual cues, Amituanai highlights sometimes-unexpected Antipodean connections. “I’m really interested in what is taken on in a place, but also what gets left behind”, she says, “the blurry lines of where you draw cultural lines or borders between yourself and a place”.

In APT10, practitioners from Aotearoa offer conceptually and materially diverse projects. Many reimagine understandings of place by mapping journeys, confronting memories, or visiting possible futures. Some urge us to rebuild and heal. At the time of writing, catastrophic flooding pummelled areas of South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales. In the aftermath, QAGOMA was closed for weeks while significant losses were sustained by galleries, artists and cultural centres elsewhere. It reminds us how environmental precarity and anthropogenic climate change are destabilising national and regional futures. In the face of such devastation, art feels not enough. Questions of sustainability, let alone capitalism, colonialism and cultural power structures, must all be reckoned with by Triennials and Biennials globally. As QAGOMA continues exploring what this means for their institution, APT10 responds in the only way art can, by offering space for entanglement, exchange and new ways of understanding the world around us.