Gertrude Contemporary

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.

Next at Glasshouse⁠⁠Tarik Ahlip⁠Feast of the Compradors⁠⁠⁠11 September – 17 October 2026⁠Gertrude Glasshouse⁠44 Glasshou...
28/08/2026

Next at Glasshouse⁠
⁠
Tarik Ahlip⁠
Feast of the Compradors⁠
⁠⁠
11 September – 17 October 2026⁠
Gertrude Glasshouse⁠
44 Glasshouse Road, Collingwood⁠
Wurundjeri Country⁠
⁠
Opening event: Friday 11 September, 6 – 8pm⁠
⁠
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.⁠
⁠
Studies for a Failed State (2026) is a series of small-scale models concerned with the idea of architecture as a tool for state propaganda, drawing on various global civic and ministerial forms as well as the works of speculative architects Étienne-Louis Boullée and Giovanni Battista Piranesi. The namesake work of the exhibition, Feast of the Compradors (2026), depicts a vista viewed through an architectural installation. The video work that accompanies these sculptural works compiles excerpts from interviews and presentations by Samir Amin relating to systems of global capital, and the impact of imperialist hegemonic expression on West Asian sovereignty.⁠
⁠
- ⁠
⁠
Tarik Ahlip is a multidisciplinary artist with a background in architecture whose practice spans sculpture, film, verse and sound. Ahlip has gained recognition for documentary work (31.05.2010 - a survivor’s account of the 2010 attack on civilian activist vessel Mavi Marmara by Israeli forces), as well as projects on migrant social formation and⁠
historical revisionism.⁠
⁠
Tarik Ahlip, 9 Minutes with Samir Amin, 2026, single channel film, duration 9 minutes. Courtesy of the artist.⁠
⁠
https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/tarik-ahlip-feast-of-the-compradors

Thank you for joining us for the opening event of two new exhibitions – Marlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris, After all, ...
26/08/2026

Thank you for joining us for the opening event of two new exhibitions – Marlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris, After all, and Leyla Stevens, A Temple in Three Acts.

The exhibitions are open Tuesday – Saturday, 11am - 5pm. ⁠
⁠
22 August – 17 October 2026⁠
Gertrude Contemporary ⁠
21-31 High Street, Preston South⁠
Wurundjeri Country⁠
⁠
Event documentation by Machiko Abe.⁠

https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/leyla-stevens-a-temple-in-three-acts
https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/marlene-gilson-oam-and-matthew-harris-after-all

OPENING TOMORROWMarlene Gilson OAM & Matthew HarrisAfter AllJoin us tomorrow, Saturday 22 August, from 3pm at Gertrude C...
21/08/2026

OPENING TOMORROW
Marlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris
After All

Join us tomorrow, Saturday 22 August, from 3pm at Gertrude Contemporary for a Welcome to Country & the exhibition opening celebration. ⁠

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 is represented by Futures Gallery Naarm Melbourne & The Commercial Sydney.

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

OPENING TOMORROWLeyla StevensA Temple in Three ActsJoin us tomorrow, Saturday 22 August, from 3pm at Gertrude Contempora...
20/08/2026

OPENING TOMORROW
Leyla Stevens
A Temple in Three Acts

Join us tomorrow, Saturday 22 August, from 3pm at Gertrude Contemporary for a Welcome to Country & the exhibition opening celebration. ⁠

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 and neighbourhood in Kuta.

Signalling a material turn in the artist’s predominantly moving image-based practice, temple trees, carvings and shrine decoration are represented through sculpture, drawings and prints. These material fragments map a story of trade and migration, positioning the temple as both a site of familial memory and a living archive of south Bali’s 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 might look like when steeped in tropical rain and co-habitation with birds and insects.

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.

Leyla Stevens, A Temple in Three Acts (research image), 2026, silver gelatin print, image courtesy and © the artist⁠
⁠
https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/leyla-stevens-a-temple-in-three-acts

An accomplished and widely respected contemporary artist, academic and educator, Cate Consandine’s resonance and generos...
19/08/2026

An accomplished and widely respected contemporary artist, academic and educator, Cate Consandine’s resonance and generosity in artistic and academic communities has supported a new generation of contemporary art practitioners.

We encourage listening to or attending the forthcoming public program Art Forum: The art of Dr Cate Consandine (1970 – 2026) by Dr Kyla McFarlane – Thursday 20 August, 12.15pm, Federation Hall, Victorian College of the Arts, for a deepened engagement with her practice.

It was with great sadness that Gertrude joined the contemporary art community in mourning the tragic passing of Cate Consandine earlier this year. In a community like Gertrude's, the impacts of a practitioner such as Cate introduces a legacy of thought, methodology and mentorship across new cohorts of artists. Cate was central to the Victorian College of the Arts and Monash University and remained connected to the legacies of the Gertrude Studio Program beyond her own time in the studios (2002 – 2004).

Since her time in residence at Gertrude, Cate would attend the openings and programs of students and graduates, who she frequently and sincerely championed. For this reason, and with the hope of respecting the meaningful artistic legacy of the artist, Gertrude wishes to reflect on Cate’s time in the Gertrude Studio Program, as a learning and experimental contemporary artist, during the early 2000s.

This reflection and archival imagery is published online. Vale Cate Consandine.

https://gertrude.org.au/news/vale-cate-consandine

Thank you for joining us for the opening event of Waiho i te toipoto (keep close together)⁠ by Renee Cosgrave & Maia Kre...
18/08/2026

Thank you for joining us for the opening event of Waiho i te toipoto (keep close together)⁠ by Renee Cosgrave & Maia Kreisler⁠. Our thanks in particular to Anahera Neho-Cooper and Waru Cooper for generously opening the space and exhibition.⁠
⁠
On Saturday 22 August at 12.30pm, please join us for Kai and Kōrero (food and conversation). Shared kai (potluck lunch). Bring something if you can. This will be a safe space – All welcome / Nau mai haere mai.⁠
⁠
–⁠
⁠
Waiho i te toipoto (keep close together)⁠
Renee Cosgrave & Maia Kreisler⁠
⁠
8 August – 5 September 2026⁠
Gertrude Glasshouse⁠
44 Glasshouse Road, Collingwood⁠
Wurundjeri Country⁠
⁠
As an exhibition title, Waiho i te Toipoto evokes whānau and kinship, whakapapa and ancestral connection, community and collective care, belonging and the bonds that endure across distance and time. For these bodies of work, both concerned with whakapapa, memory, and relationships, they carry both a personal and collective meaning without being overly descriptive. Whakapapa is often translated as genealogy or family lineage. In simple terms, whakapapa is the story of where you come from and how you are connected. This collaborative exhibition brings into dialogue a wall painting by Gertrude Studio Artist Renee Cosgrave (Ngāti Tūwharetoa) and a series of recent works by Maia Kreisler (Ngāti Mutunga & Te Āti Awa), contextualised and expanded through an exhibition text by Emma Hislop (Kāi Tahu)⁠
⁠
– ⁠
⁠
Renee Cosgrave is represented by .gallery, Naarm Melbourne.⁠
Maia Kreisler is represented by , Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland.⁠
⁠
Gertrude Glasshouse is generously supported by Michael Schwarz and David Clouston.⁠
⁠
Photography by Machiko Abe ⁠

https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/waiho-i-te-toipoto-keep-close-together
⁠
⁠

INVITATIONLeyla Stevens⁠A Temple in Three ActsWelcome to Country & opening event:22 August 2026, 3 – 5pm⁠22 August – 17 ...
18/08/2026

INVITATION
Leyla Stevens⁠
A Temple in Three Acts

Welcome to Country & opening event:
22 August 2026, 3 – 5pm
⁠
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 and neighbourhood in Kuta.⁠
⁠
Signalling a material turn in the artist’s predominantly moving image-based practice, temple trees, carvings and shrine decoration are represented through sculpture, drawings and prints. These material fragments map a story of trade and migration, positioning the temple as both a site of familial memory and a living archive of south Bali’s 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 might look like when steeped in tropical rain and co-habitation with birds and insects.⁠
⁠
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.⁠
⁠
Leyla works collaboratively as a member of Woven Kolektif and is a lecturer in Fine Arts at Monash University, Naarm Melbourne.⁠
⁠
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body.

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

18/08/2026

Join us on Saturday 22 August at 3pm for the opening celebration of After all, a new exhibition by Marlene Gilson OAM & Matthew Harris.

Welcome to Country & opening event:
22 August 2026, 3 – 5pm

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 reorient 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.

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

Marlene Gilson OAM is represented by Sydney.

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

Invitation: Renee Cosgrave & Maia KreislerWaiho i te toipoto (keep close together)Opening event Saturday 15 August, 3 – ...
11/08/2026

Invitation:
Renee Cosgrave & Maia Kreisler
Waiho i te toipoto (keep close together)

Opening event Saturday 15 August, 3 – 5pm

8 August – 5 September 2026
Gertrude Glasshouse
44 Glasshouse Road, Collingwood
Wurundjeri Country

Join us Saturday 15 August from 3pm for the opening event of Waiho i te toipoto (keep close together), a new exhibition by Gertrude Studio Artist Renee Cosgrave and Maia Kreisler.

As an exhibition title, Waiho i te Toipoto evokes whānau and kinship, whakapapa and ancestral connection, community and collective care, belonging and the bonds that endure across distance and time. For these bodies of work, both concerned with whakapapa, memory, and relationships, they carry both a personal and collective meaning without being overly descriptive. Whakapapa is often translated as genealogy or family lineage. In simple terms, whakapapa is the story of where you come from and how you are connected. This collaborative exhibition brings into dialogue a wall painting by Gertrude Studio Artist Renee Cosgrave (Ngāti Tūwharetoa) and a series of recent works by Maia Kreisler (Ngāti Mutunga & Te Āti Awa), contextualised and expanded through an exhibition text by Emma Hislop (Kāi Tahu)

–

Renee Cosgrave is represented by Hayden’s Gallery, Naarm Melbourne.
Maia Kreisler is represented by Season Aotearoa, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland.

Gertrude Glasshouse is generously supported by Michael Schwarz and David Clouston.

Renee Cosgrave, work in progress, 2026, oil on canvas. Copyright and courtesy the artist. Image: Renee Cosgrave
Maia Kreisler, Upoko (detail), 2026 ceramic and silver oil paint. Copyright and courtesy the artist. Image: Maia Kreisler
⁠
https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/waiho-i-te-toipoto-keep-close-together

Gertrude is thrilled to congratulate Exhibiting Alum Ryan Presley and Gertrude Studio Artist Alum Jenna Lee for their s...
09/08/2026

Gertrude is thrilled to congratulate Exhibiting Alum Ryan Presley and Gertrude Studio Artist Alum Jenna Lee for their success at the 2026 Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards (NATSIAA).

Presley’s ‘Our lifestyle of tranquility undisturbed,’ won the headlining Telstra Art Award. Lee’s ‘Taking back taken’ won the Telstra Works on Paper Award.

In 2023 Ryan Presley presented 'Fresh Hell,' a solo show at Gertrude Contemporary. Co-commissioned by ACE Adelaide and Gertrude 'Fresh Hell' wrestled with themes of power and dominion, bringing together a suite of paintings that Presley had been steadily developing over the previous eight years, for the first time in a major solo exhibition.

Jenna Lee was a member of the Gertrude Studio Program from 2024-2026. In 2025 she presented a solo show ‘Burn Before Reading’ at Gertrude Glasshouse in 2025, honouring the lasting presence of language in Country, and the ways it carries knowledge and vocabulary essential to understanding and caring for the environment. Drawing upon the ecological phenomenon of epicormic growth Lee posits that just as landscapes can recover after devastation, so too can languages endure and flourish.

Images:
Installation view of Ryan Presley, 'Fresh Hell' at Gertrude Contemporary, 2023. Photo: Christian Capurro
Installation view of Ryan Presley, 'Fresh Hell' at Gertrude Contemporary, 2023. Photo: Christian Capurro.
Jenna Lee Studio Portrait, 2024. Photo Machiko Abe
Jenna Lee, Burn before reading (detail), 2025, installation view, pages of Aboriginal Words and Place Names, calligraphy ink, florist wire, glue, Burn Before Reading, Gertrude Glasshouse, Naarm Melbourne, 2025, image courtesy of the artist and MARS Gallery, Naarm Melbourne © the artist, photograph: Christian Capurro

https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/ryan-presley-fresh-hell

https://gertrude.org.au/exhibition/jenna-lee-burn-before-reading

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

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Gertrude Contemporary posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Shortcuts

Share

Category