Artist: Brook Andrew

Tolarno Galleries presents transitions, Brook Andrew’s new exhibition of mixed-media works.

In seven of these new works, the artist’s hand is immediately apparent through the vigorous oil-pastel markings covering glazed and framed 19th-century lithographs.

Several are embellished with black and white stripes that mimic Andrews’ well-known wall drawings, inspired by Wiradjuri dendroglyphs, or tree carvings, and coming from an ancient line of carving practices.

“My practice has always been influenced by the carving traditions of the Wiradjuri, my mother’s Country,” says Andrew. “Employing these shield markings is a way to create visual distortion or optical illusion, which is helpful when we’re trying to navigate histories, create new memories or even shift meanings.”

The ceremonial markings function as a kind of protective screen over images of men and women from Van Diemen’s Land or New Holland; Native American people performing in a circus; settlers during the expansion phase of what is now the United States; and an expedition in Africa.

Andrew has responded to each image by leaving certain areas unmarked – faces, for example. In others, he subverts the intended narrative by deciding what the viewer can and can’t see, creating a playful web of real-time interactions.

“This exhibition is about how stories and memories are woven through early documentation,” says Andrew. “This sort of documentation had the power to write legacies, but now it offers the opportunity to re-see these narratives anew.”

There is a graphic tension between the viscous oil pastel and the flawless lithography beneath, out of which stare eyes in a trance, meeting the viewer’s gaze or inspecting their new surroundings.

“I enjoy working with oil pastel because it’s sticky and tactile and organic,” says Andrew. “It’s almost like ochre in another form.”

Drawing in this way also creates another layer of illusion and transition.

“There’s a 15mm space between the actual image and the glass I’m drawing on,” explains Andrew. “When light falls on the work it creates a shadow pattern, an effect I also used in works such as Sexy & Dangerous I 1996.”

Three larger works break the mould somewhat. transitions 1 2025 is a drawing of “spiritual creatures” – one red, one white – against a background of gun-metal grey paint on silver foil, which imparts a reflective quality.

“In using the colour gun-metal grey, I’m referring back to my ghostly portraiture series Gun-metal Grey 2007,” says Andrew of his celebrated body of work that emerged from extensive research at the Royal Anthropological Institute, London and the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge.

“This work is about a veiling of subjects in order to give them a different kind of power,” says Andrew. “They can exist at any time and place in our imagination through the narratives we weave.”

In transitions 2 2025, a photograph of two young Aboriginal children has been placed against another gun-metal-grey background, overlaid with a red rectangle decorated in white markings. Also affixed to the support are several vintage postcards and a photograph.

And in silence 2025, we see a glowing figure from behind, next to a floating object coloured orange and green and decorated with small blue circles. Enveloping both in a C-shaped course is an orange river with the word ‘SILENCE’ written on it.

Andrew has been collecting archival prints, photographs and objects for his entire career. Responding to this resource, he has developed a powerful and distinctive visual language that reconfigures received histories.

“transitions is about how we have the power to reimagine and transform often fixed narratives into new memories and realities, to heal, and to remember with freedom of expression and gentle playfulness,” says Andrew.

Tony Magnusson, 2025