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Gertrude Contemporary Gertrude Contemporary is a non-profit gallery and studio complex supporting contemporary artists.

Gertrude Contemporary is valued nationally and respected internationally as a dynamic centre for the production and presentation of contemporary art. With the artist placed firmly at the centre of our community, we foster a culture of risk, collaboration and critical-thinking to generate innovative programs that engage audiences in creative exchange. For our program, news and updates go to: https://gertrude.org.au/

Subscribe to our mailing list by e-mailing [email protected] with 'Mailing List' in the subject line.

Artist TalkJoin us this Saturday 3 October at 3pm for a conversation between Leyla Stevens and Bianca Winataputri discus...
01/10/2026

Artist Talk

Join us this Saturday 3 October at 3pm for a conversation between Leyla Stevens and Bianca Winataputri discussing the artist’s exhibition, A Temple in Three Acts⁠.⁠

22 August – 17 October 2026⁠
Gertrude Contemporary⁠
21-31 High Street, Preston South⁠
Wurundjeri Country⁠

In A Temple in Three Acts, Leyla Stevens responds to the evolving nature of cultural preservation and inheritance in south Bali amidst the region’s urbanisation and environmental decline. Conceived as a series of interconnected acts, the exhibition centres on material and architectural details found in the artist’s family temple, and in its expanded location within the family home – which doubles as a hotel – and the surrounding neighbourhood in Kuta.

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Leyla Stevens is an Australian-Balinese artist who works predominately within an expanded documentary and lens-based practice. Her work is informed by ongoing engagements with storied places, archives, cultural geographies and performance lineages through a transcultural lens. Leyla’s research-lead practice is centred on collaborative engagements with place and communities, and the recuperation of counter-histories within dominant narratives.⁠
⁠
Bianca Winataputri is a curator, writer, researcher, and podcast host based in Indonesia and Australia. She has a Ph.D. in Art History and Theory from Monash Art, Design, and Architecture (MADA) and her research focuses on contemporary Southeast Asian art and exhibitions. She is currently a Lecturer at the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture (MADA) at Monash University.⁠
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Leyla Stevens, A Temple in Three Acts, installation views, Gertrude Contemporary, Naarm Melbourne, 2026, images courtesy and © the artists, photography: Christian Capurro⁠ & Machiko Abe⁠
⁠
https://gertrude.org.au/public-program/in-conversation-leyla-stevens-and-bianca-winatapuri

Gertrude is thrilled to congratulate all participating artists in the 18th Lyon Biennale of Contemporary Art, including ...
26/09/2026

Gertrude is thrilled to congratulate all participating artists in the 18th Lyon Biennale of Contemporary Art, including Studio alumni Mikala Dwyer, Matthew Harris and Nicholas Mangan, and exhibiting alumni Yuriyal Eric Bridgeman, Kirtika Kain, Angelica Mesiti and Tina Stefanou.

La Biennale de Lyon is a cultural enterprise that since 1991 has alternatingly presented 2 major international events: the Dance Biennale and the Contemporary Art Biennale. The 18th edition of the Contemporary Art Biennale, ‘To pass from one dream to another’ will be presented from 19 September–13 December, 2026.

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‘To pass from one dream to another,’ the main title of the 18th edition of the Biennale of Contemporary Art draws on the traboules—those distinctive passageways running through Lyon’s courtyards and buildings—to explore how one moves from one mode of perception to another, from one collective dream to another.

Drawing on the writings of Walter Benjamin and Robert Filliou's Principes d’économie poétique, Catherine Nichols develops a project situated between critique and invention. While Benjamin reveals how capitalism produces a collective dream whose continuity must be interrupted, Filliou proposes that other forms of economy can be explored through artistic and social practices. The Biennale focuses on those moments when the apparent stability of the present begins to fracture, and other imaginaries become possible.

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Mikala Dwyer, Gertrude Edition 2023: Untitled (Snakeloop Flat Drop) & Untitled (Tear Flat Drop), 2023, Produced by Spacecraft, Naarm Melbourne.
Yuriyal Eric Bridgeman, Sikiram / Büng / Scrum, 2019, installation view, Polyphonic Reverb, curated by Mark Feary, 2022. Photo: Christian Capurro.
Matthew Harris, 'Doom', 2022, presented in Gertrude Studios 2022, curated by Tim Riley Walsh. Photo: Christian Capurro
Kirtika Kain, beast, 2022; gold, 2022; and mixed black, 2021, installation view, Empty Pockets, curated by Sineenart Meena, 2022. Photo: Chrisitan Capurro.
Angelica Mesiti, Rapture (Silent Anthem), 2009, installation view, Transcendence, curated by Pip Wallis, 2014. Photo courtesy of the artist and Gertrude Archive.
Nicholas Mangan, The Colony, 2005, installation view. Courtesy of the artist and Gertrude Archives.

23/09/2026

Gertrude is now accepting applications for the Dedicated First Nations Studio as part of the Gertrude Studio Program 2027 intake.

Respected both nationally and internationally, Gertrude’s unique studio-exhibition model supports outstanding artists at pivotal moments in their careers. The Gertrude Studio Program has been at the core of the organisation since its founding more than four decades ago.

Each year, Gertrude offers a fully-subsidised studio for a First Nations artist as part of the Gertrude Studio Program call out. At any given time there are at least two First Nations artists in the Gertrude Studio Program.

The fully-subsidised studio opportunity is open to First Nations peoples of Australia, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Applicants for the fully-subsidised studio are assessed and determined by a panel of First Nations artists and industry peers. All applicants apply via the same application form with an option to nominate your eligibility for the fully-subsidised studio.

Participation in the two-year Studio Program includes an individual studio, as well as access to all of the shared communal spaces and workshop facilities. The Program includes a funded solo exhibition at Gertrude Glasshouse and participation in the annual Gertrude Studios exhibition at Gertrude Contemporary. During the residency, Gertrude facilitates studio visits by arts professionals, promotional advocacy, and remunerated education and public program opportunities for participants.

Gertrude encourages applications from First Nations artists living at the intersections of cultural, linguistic, gender-diverse, and d/Deaf or disabled experiences. Gertrude is committed to providing a culturally safe space and respectful workplace in dialogue with all staff and participating artists.

Applications are due by 11:59pm on Monday 26 October 2026. All applications are through the same application form. For enquiries, refer to the FAQ document or contact Gertrude to discuss any access or alternative submission requirements.

Learn more and apply at the link in bio.

Photography: Machiko Abe

https://gertrude.org.au/news/first-nations-studio-2027

Gertrude Contemporary and Gertrude Glasshouse are closed Friday 25 September for the public holiday. We will be back to ...
22/09/2026

Gertrude Contemporary and Gertrude Glasshouse are closed Friday 25 September for the public holiday.

We will be back to business as usual Saturday.

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Current exhibitions:

A Temple in Three Acts⁠
Leyla Stevens⁠

After all
Marlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris

22 August – 17 October 2026⁠
Gertrude Contemporary⁠
21-31 High Street, Preston South⁠
Wurundjeri Country⁠

Tarik Ahlip⁠
Feast of the Compradors⁠
⁠⁠
11 September – 17 October 2026⁠
Gertrude Glasshouse⁠
44 Glasshouse Road, Collingwood⁠
Wurundjeri Country

Artist Talk and ReviewJoin us on Saturday 3 October at 3pm for a conversation between Leyla Stevens and Bianca Winataput...
19/09/2026

Artist Talk and Review

Join us on Saturday 3 October at 3pm for a conversation between Leyla Stevens and Bianca Winataputri discussing the artist’s exhibition, A Temple in Three Acts⁠.
⁠
22 August – 17 October 2026⁠
Gertrude Contemporary⁠
21-31 High Street, Preston South⁠
Wurundjeri Country⁠
⁠
“Stevens’s engagement with Pura Taman Sari situates and highlights the tension between past and present, as well as how that tension manifests itself in the study and making of archives, remnants that help piece together place knowledge. One could read Stevens’s exhibition as a narrative arc, where meaning-making sits within the three acts defined by Syd Field; beginning, middle and end or setting, conflict and resolution.”⁠
⁠
Tahmina Maskinyar on Leyla Stevens’ A Temple in Three Acts for Memo Review. ⁠
⁠
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⁠
Leyla Stevens is an Australian-Balinese artist who works predominately within an expanded documentary and lens-based practice. Her work is informed by ongoing engagements with storied places, archives, cultural geographies and performance lineages through a transcultural lens. Leyla’s research-lead practice is centred on collaborative engagements with place and communities, and the recuperation of counter-histories within dominant narratives.⁠
⁠
Bianca Winataputri is a curator, writer, researcher, and podcast host based in Indonesia and Australia. She has a Ph.D. in Art History and Theory from Monash Art, Design, and Architecture (MADA) and her research focuses on contemporary Southeast Asian art and exhibitions. She is currently a Lecturer at the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture (MADA) at Monash University.⁠
⁠
Leyla Stevens, A Temple in Three Acts, installation views, Gertrude Contemporary, Naarm Melbourne, 2026, images courtesy and © the artists, photography: Christian Capurro⁠ & Machiko Abe⁠

https://gertrude.org.au/public-program/in-conversation-leyla-stevens-and-bianca-winatapuri

https://www.memoreview.net/reviews/a-temple-in-three-acts-by-tahmina-maskinyar

16/09/2026

Gertrude Studio Program 2027
Applications Now Open⁠

Gertrude is now accepting applications for the Gertrude Studio Program 2027 intake.⁠

Respected both nationally and internationally, Gertrude’s unique studio-exhibition model supports outstanding artists at pivotal moments in their careers. The two-year Gertrude Studio Program has been at the core of the organisation since its founding more than four decades ago.

Participation in the 2-year Studio Program includes an individual studio, as well as access to all of the shared communal spaces and workshop facilities. The Program includes a funded solo exhibition at Gertrude Glasshouse and participation in the annual Gertrude Studios exhibition at Gertrude Contemporary. During the residency, Gertrude facilitates studio visits by arts professionals, promotional advocacy, and remunerated education and public program opportunities for participants.

The highly subsidised artist studios are located at Gertrude Contemporary, 21-31 High Street, Preston South, and are co-located with Gertrude’s public exhibition spaces and the organisation’s offices.

Gertrude invites applications from practicing artists across any medium whose work reflects the rich intersectionality of contemporary arts practice to express their interest in the two-year program.

Gertrude encourages applications from First Nations artists, as well as people living at the intersections of cultural, linguistic, gender-diverse, and d/Deaf or disabled experiences. Gertrude is committed to providing a culturally safe space and respectful workplace in dialogue with all staff and participating artists.

Applications are due by 11:59pm on Monday 26 October 2026. For any enquiries, please refer to the FAQ document or contact Gertrude to discuss any access or alternative submission requirements.

Learn more and apply at the link below

https://gertrude.org.au/news/applications-now-open-or-gertrude-studios-2027⁠

Photography: Machiko Abe.

Thank you for joining us for the opening event of Tarik Ahlip's⁠ new exhibition Feast of the Compradors⁠ at Gertrude Gla...
15/09/2026

Thank you for joining us for the opening event of Tarik Ahlip's⁠ new exhibition Feast of the Compradors⁠ at Gertrude Glasshouse. ⁠
⁠⁠
The exhibition is open Thursday – Saturday, 12-5pm. ⁠
⁠
11 September – 17 October 2026⁠
Gertrude Glasshouse⁠
44 Glasshouse Road, Collingwood⁠
Wurundjeri Country⁠
⁠
Feast of the Compradors is a presentation drawing on two years of practical research into modern West Asian political and economic history. This body of work draws heavily from the work of Franco-Egyptian economist Samir Amin (1931 - 2018) in considering the significance of the region as a node for resource extraction in the development of modern capitalism, and the devastating effect of its integration into the modern global system.⁠
⁠
https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/tarik-ahlip-feast-of-the-compradors

- ⁠
⁠ahlip⁠
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Event documentation: Machiko Abe ⁠
⁠

Now OpenAfter allMarlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris22 August – 17 October 2026Gertrude Contemporary21-31 High Street, P...
12/09/2026

Now Open
After all
Marlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris

22 August – 17 October 2026
Gertrude Contemporary
21-31 High Street, Preston South
Wurundjeri Country

After all presents a selection of works from the past decade by revered senior artist and Wadawurrung Elder Marlene Gilson OAM, in dialogue with a series of new paintings by Matthew Harris whose practice draws reference from his mixed Koorie / European heritage. Gilson's practice is noteworthy for its efforts to overturn the colonial grasp on the past by reclaiming and re-contextualising the representation of historical events. Through this, she asserts the presence of First Nations peoples, before and after colonisation, on what always was and always will be Aboriginal Land. Favouring the ancestral lands of her people, and events that have occurred on their lands, as her preferred subject matter and context, Gilson's elaborately painted history paintings provide the counter to the historical representations that misrepresent such histories, through fictionalisation or erasure.

Harris’ new series of paintings shares similar concerns with the reorientation of history narratives. In recent years, Harris has entwined traditional processes of Aboriginal pigment production with the western canon of minimal abstraction. In ways, this operates to invert late modernism’s adoption of Aboriginal practices as purely aesthetic forms of painterly abstraction, vanquishing their expressions of dreaming, of Country, and as culturally specific modes of storytelling. Instead, Harris corrupts the purported autonomy of minimalist abstraction to render depictions of Country, and to reveal and undermine structures of colonisation and its residual power differentials. Often employing dark humour, Harris plays the part of a destabiliser, agitating western art history, its predilections and institutions, to assert Aboriginal-centric worldviews.

Marlene Gilson OAM is represented by Martin Browne Contemporary Sydney.

Matthew Harris is represented by FUTURES, Naarm Melbourne; and The Commercial, Sydney.

Marlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris, after all, installation views, Gertrude Contemporary, Naarm Melbourne, 2026, image courtesy and © the artists, photograph: Christian Capurro.

https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/marlene-gilson-oam-and-matthew-harris-after-all

Now OpenA Temple in Three ActsLeyla Stevens22 August – 17 October 2026Gertrude Contemporary21-31 High Street, Preston So...
12/09/2026

Now Open

A Temple in Three Acts
Leyla Stevens

22 August – 17 October 2026
Gertrude Contemporary
21-31 High Street, Preston South
Wurundjeri Country

In A Temple in Three Acts, Leyla Stevens responds to the evolving nature of cultural preservation and inheritance in south Bali amidst the region’s urbanisation and environmental decline. Conceived as a series of interconnected acts, the exhibition centres on material and architectural details found in the artist’s family temple, and in its expanded location within the family home – which doubles as a hotel – and the surrounding neighbourhood in Kuta.

Temple trees, carvings and shrine decoration are represented through drawings, photographic prints and sculptures cast in beeswax and resin – a material turn within the artist’s predominantly lens-based practice. A new video work featuring the artist’s family members documents the art of Payas Bali – the elaborate ceremonial attire, hair and makeup worn during rites of passage. The video also honours the legacy of Leyla’s grandfather, a goldsmith whose pieces feature throughout the footage. Together, these elements map stories of shifting traditions and inheritance, positioning the temple as both a site of familial memory and an enduring archive of south Bali’s rapid cultural and socio-economic shifts.

In a region transformed by mass tourism, temples persist as heritage sites protected by their sacred status. Responding to her family’s approach to caring for and preserving their temple, Leyla Stevens’ A Temple in Three Acts engages with approaches to cultural continuity that challenge the logic of western heritage practices, speculating on what conservation practices might look like when steeped in tropical rain and co-habitation with birds and insects.

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Leyla Stevens, A Temple in Three Acts, installation views, Gertrude Contemporary, Naarm Melbourne, 2026, image courtesy and © the artists, photograph: Christian Capurro

https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/leyla-stevens-a-temple-in-three-acts

Gertrude is excited to congratulate Gertrude Studio Artist Alum Elyas Alavi for winning the inaugural Artbank Prize.The ...
04/09/2026

Gertrude is excited to congratulate Gertrude Studio Artist Alum Elyas Alavi for winning the inaugural Artbank Prize.

The Artbank Prize, established to support outstanding contemporary Australian artists, is a new national acquisitive prize.

Alavi took part in the Gertrude Studio program from 2023-2025. His 2023 solo exhibition at Gertrude Glasshouse, دیگرگونه ANOTHER KIND, presented a selection of drawings and paintings acting as a visual diary. Through these works, Alavi documented and processed his feelings and memories connected to his q***r identity.

Elyas Alavi, Gertrude Contemporary, 2024. Photograph: Machiko Abe
Elyas Alavi, دیگرگونه ANOTHER KIND, installation views, Gertrude Glasshouse Naarm Melbourne, 2023, image courtesy and © the artist, photograph: Christian Capurro

https://gertrude.org.au/artist/elyas-alavi

Address

21-31 High Steet
Preston, VIC
3072

Opening Hours

Tuesday 11am - 5pm
Wednesday 11am - 5pm
Thursday 11am - 5pm
Friday 11am - 5pm
Saturday 11am - 5pm

Telephone

+61394800068

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