William Yang's Mardi Gras

Exhibition Review: Photography | Brian Rope

William Yang's Mardi Gras | William Yang

National Library of Australia (NLA) Treasures Gallery | 6 December 2023 – 1 December 2024

One of my prized possessions is a copy of Yang's book China, inscribed simply by his own hand “To Brian, Best Wishes, William Yang, Port Macquarie, 2011”. I had just heard and seen one of his presentations during the Australian Photographic Society’s annual convention in that coastal centre.

Yang is a well-known and renowned Australian performer, filmmaker, artist, and photographer. He began his career shooting fashion, but soon shifted to social documentary. Gay liberation, illegal Sydney warehouse parties, and AIDS-related deaths were all documented by this photographer.

Born in Mareeba, North Queensland, in 1943, Yang was raised in the little village of Dimbulah in the Atherton Tablelands. He got his first camera when he was seventeen but didn't start taking photography seriously until he was a university student. He relocated to Sydney in 1969 with the intention of becoming a playwright, but instead found employment as a freelance photographer covering social events. When his 1977 solo exhibition Sydneyphiles opened at the Australian Centre for Photography, his images received critical acclaim.

That exhibition gave viewers an almost voyeuristic glimpse into the social circles and private lives of people who were rarely seen by the general public, including socialites, fashion designers, actors, directors, artists, and Sydney's gay community. The community at that time was controversial as homosexual behaviour was prohibited. In Australia, pictures of gay life, love, and sex had never been shown so widely. Those who were gay and had their photos taken by the artist ran the risk of losing their jobs or facing rejection from their families.

In 1978, a newly formed Gay Solidarity Group held a protest demonstration followed by a parade celebrating queer pride: the Mardi Gras. Due to illness, Yang missed the first three annual parades whilst convalescing in Queensland. Returning to Sydney in time for the 1981 parade, Yang became a pre-eminent chronicler of Mardi Gras.

More than 250 of Yang’s photographs are held by the NLA. Among them are series relating to artists, writers, actors, celebrities, friends, Chinese Australians, intimate dinners, boisterous parties, and the Mardi Gras. This NLA Collections-in-Focus exhibition, William Yang’s Mardi Gras, displays material from over 20 years of photography documenting the parades. Originally opened late in 2023, the exhibition had to close whilst the venue was being renovated but has now resumed.

The 24 images displayed (all with Yang's trademark handwritten descriptions on them) explore four themes: Protest, Community, Art and Remembrance. What began as a protest event celebrating queer life, also became a community event; an artistic event; an event to remember people of the community lost to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

An image of a fairy makes a statement about the courage of revealing oneself as a gay/queer at that time.

Fairy, Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras, 1982. William Yang (National Library of Australia-nla.obj-136859502)

An image of two people lighting a candle effectively and sensitively remembers those who died from AIDS.

“The Last Candle.” AIDS Vigil 1994. 2/10. William Yang (National Library of Australia-nla.obj-136864462)

Morals crusader, Fred Nile, was made fun of in the 1989 parade when a Papier Mâché version of his head on a platter made an appearance. Yang was there to get an image.

The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence and the Head of Fred Nile
1989 Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras. William Yang
(National Library of Australia-nla.obj-136862227)

Yang was also there in 2009 to capture a simple, but effective, image of a protestor urging people to fight AIDS rather than Iraq where Australia had been involved in armed conflict from 2003.

“Protest.” NSW Mardi Gras. 2009 1/10. William Yang (National Library of Australia-nla.obj-136861261)

After years of documenting the parades, Yang wrote in his monologue Friends of Dorothy I’ve finally figured out what Mardi Gras is. It’s the re-enactment of a ritual. A ritual we have worked out over the years as defining and celebrating a gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex culture.

In a review of Yang’s Sydneyphiles Reimagined, at the State Library of New South Wales, Edward Scheer wrote Yang’s photographs …… offer the complete opposite of the selfie. ….. he offers carefully framed and curated portraits. ……. He brings the pictures back into the present moment.

This exhibition reminds us of the importance of Collections held by the NLA and other institutions. The opportunities to see exhibitions of selections from such Collections should be taken by us all if we possibly can do so.

This review is also available on the author's blog here.

THE MIRROR Angles of Resistance

Brian Rope | Photomontage, Acrylics on canvas

THE MIRROR Angles of Resistance | PETER MALONEY

CCAS Lakeside | 15 April – 3 June 2023

THE MIRROR Angles of Resistance is said to examine Canberra-based artist Peter Maloney’s practice from the perspective of his gay/queer sexuality for the first time in his 40-year career. (In 2018 Drill Hall Gallery did survey his work from the preceding 30 years.) 

This show exhibits multiple examples of Maloney’s forms of expression – completed works, informal sketches and studies sourced directly from his studio. It provides a revealing account of his working method.

The curator, and artist’s partner, Mark Bayly has written “Maloney has produced a polymorphous body of work across multiple media, including collage, painting, photography, performance, sound and video. As a painter, his early commitment to gestural abstraction has given way to a practice of genre-defying bafflement. I suggest this, because in examining Maloney’s series of works over the past twenty years, I propose that they can best be mentally assembled and appreciated – as a puzzle – in the form of a funfair hall of mirrors.”

And there we have it – a puzzle to be solved. Walking around the gallery, exploring item by item, I was astounded by the variety and diversity. I found myself studying particular pieces for lengthy periods for a host of different reasons. In some cases it was to read then re-read text, as we might do with parts of a book or quality article – perhaps searching for meanings, perhaps revelling in the beauty of the words. A work titled The Rapping Nun fascinated me with its references to Borley Rectory - famous for being described as "the most haunted house in England".

Then there were the wall cases containing items we would love to pick up and hold and explore closely. And two copies of his monogram Fugitive Text we can pick up. And various complex mixed media pieces such as ‘Untitled (dune dream)’, 2005 – collage, photomontage, acrylic paint graphite and watercolour on paper -  which can be thoroughly examined.

Peter Maloney - 'Untitled (lies that life is black and white)’, 2018 (photomontage on mountboard)

There are numerous collages using black-and-white photographs (many of naked men) and portions of text from newspapers. There is painted text and works on paper incorporating text. The use of text clearly is important to Maloney and his art practice. It is also about him – his desires, who he is, his connections to others in his community.

 

'Berghain, 10am', 2014-20 (screen print and acrylic paint on canvas stitched to cotton stretcher) - courtesy of the artist - photograph by David Paterson

One work created on celluloid film shows two portraits side by side. Is it the same person? Identical twins? Unrelated look-alikes? Its title Michael: doppelganger perhaps hints at the most unlikely latter possibility. Whatever the story, we are drawn in to look and think – the artist is expressing his feelings and emotions.

Another work I Was Never Lost, 2014 had me intrigued for a variety of reasons. Why did it include the words “Schauen sie schnell! Eine kleine sterneschnuppe”, which translate to “Take a quick look! A small shooting star”? Why did it have a ghostlike figure and an apparent likeness of Ned Kelly on either side of an image of a naked man? What is it all about? This is today’s art at its best – challenging, intriguing, always pushing the definition, sometimes even bizarre or nonsensical.

'I was never lost, says Maloney', 2014 (photo transfer, acrylic paint, beeswax, ochre on canvas) - courtesy of the artist - photograph by David Paterson

Maloney has developed an eclectic and highly personal art style. Nowhere is that more evident than in Electroclash, 2002-12 which comprises sixteen pieces in various media, including paint on canvas, plywood, B/W photographs, phototransfer and collage on paper, and even an electric lead.

'Electroclash', 2002-12 (16 elements in various media, including acrylic paint on canvas, plywood, electric lead, B/W photographs, phototransfer and collage on paper) - courtesy of the artist - photograph by David Paterson

There are B/W and colourful large canvases - The Honey, 2010, Red Hot Hill Flattener, 2014 and Applause, 2002.

Peter Maloney - 'The Honey', 2010 (acrylic on canvas)

Peter Maloney - 'Red Hot Hill Flattener’, 2014 (acrylic on canvas)

And, wonderfully, a work titled Untitled (Greg in the studio), 2012 which is a photocopy of a photograph of a distressed photocopy (which, presumably, was of a photograph).

This review was first published in The Canberra Times on page 11 of Panorama and online on 6/5/23 here. It is also available on the author's blog here.