The Personal is Political

The title of this exhibition honours a retrospective exhibition of the work of the late Ann Newmarch (1945–2022) presented at the Art Gallery of South Australia in 1997. In this focussed selection of works from the Geelong Gallery collection, we pay tribute to three of Australia’s most important artists, whose work powerfully elaborates some of the most pressing social and political issues of their times.

In 1974 Newmarch, together with Mandy Martin (1952–2021), Robert Boynes and other artists, cofounded in Adelaide the Progressive Art Movement, a politically active collective of artists who advocated for social and economic change including Australian independence, the status of women, and a nationwide car industry.

Newmarch, Martin, and Boynes used the print medium to extraordinarily powerful and influential effect throughout the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s to rail against issues of deep concern including the Vietnam War, American imperialism, uranium mining and the inequitable treatment of Aboriginal people in white Australia, exploiting the history of the print medium as a vehicle for the expression and wide distribution of political opinions.

 A Geelong Gallery exhibition