Paradise Camp opens at Powerhouse Museum Ultimo

Co-commissioned by Powerhouse Museum and Creative New Zealand, and curated by Professor Natalie King OAM, the Powerhouse has unveiled the Australian premiere of Paradise Camp by Yuki Kihara.

In 2022, Paradise Camp garnered international acclaim at the Aotearoa New Zealand pavilion at the 59th La Biennale di Venezia. In 2023, the Australian premiere includes new works created by Kihara created in response to the Powerhouse Museum’s Collection.

An interdisciplinary artist of Japanese and Samoan descent, Yuki Kihara’s work interrogates and dismantles gender roles, (mis)representation and colonial legacies in the Pacific. She was the first Pasifika, Asian and Fa’afafine (Samoa’s ‘third gender’) artist to represent Aotearoa New Zealand at La Biennale di Venezia.

Yuki Kihara is currently undertaking a creative residency at the Powerhouse, creating new works in response to the museum’s collection.

Kihara drew on the museum’s extensive collection of over 2,900 glass plate negatives by 19th Century Australian Photographer Charles Kerry to create the collage Gauguin Landscapes, melding photographs of shorelines and river scenes taken of the Samoan archipelago with landscape paintings by Gauguin.