VANCE MEDIA

Rachael Vance was invited to guest curated a group exhibition entitled "Transfer"at the Sunshine Coast University Art Gallery.

This museum presentation brings into critical focus multifaceted contemporary textile and fibre art practices from South-East Asia and positions them not as passive surfaces; but as active archives infused with topics of cultural inheritance, indigenous knowledge, geopolitics, ecology and collective experience.

These eight key artistic voices operate at the critical edge where ideologies, cultures, and borders collide. The rich messaging within these works provides a new field of vision by employing textiles as a tool to communicate contemporary topics, and the material itself represents a powerful vernacular.

Huge gratitude to the eight artists for their participation and galleries and lenders for their support. Until 3 August 2025.

Artists: Arahmaiani (ID), Cian Dayrit (PH), Patricia Perez Eustaquio (PH), Yee I-Lann (MY), Mella Jaarsma (ID), Eko Nugroho (ID), Moe Satt (MM) and Jakkai Siributr (TH).

With Arndt Art Agency, Rachael Vance worked on the ambitious presentation of works by Australian artist Del Kathryn Barton entitled "of her own nature". Representing the artist's debut solo show in London, the exhibition was staged at Cromwell Place in South Kensington in the venue's showcase exhibition space the Pavilion Gallery.

"Through her works Barton invites audiences into an imaginative and deeply sensuous realm, where ornately decorated human and animal species are rendered in expressive line and vibrant colour. “of her own nature” comprises a new suite of major large-scale paintings alongside a curated selection of prints and the artist’s animated film “The Nightingale and the Rose” (2015)—a remarkable adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s 19th century classic.

Each painting within the show exists as its own entity, containing unique figures with individual states of being. Collectively the pieces aim to interrogate notions of femininity, creation, and the divinity of the cosmos in dialogue with each other. From Barton’s perspective, the world is vivid and unbidden. Its creator is the mother, the maker, the birther. Its inhabitants are she-beasts, existing in warrior states. All that is asked of the viewer when entering the gallery space is to come with eyes wide open, brain wide open, and heart wide open. To leave preconceived notions and expectations at the door with the possibility of being rewarded by an uncompromising, universal and unbending truth.

The figures depicted in her pieces exist as expressions of Barton’s inner world. Female-presenting figures rise from bodies of water, as phoenixes from fire, surrounded by fantastical flora and fauna as they arrive in their authentic, full life force. Technicoloured serpents slide across the works, their rainbow scales capturing a sense of movement across canvas. Corporeal bodies exist in dichotomous dynamics with one another, many examining both interpersonal and internal power structures. Gigantic flowers and all-encompassing webs sit within the space cradling the women and creatures who stare, unflinching, at the viewer and challenge them to look away. The works overflow with the artist’s personal lived experience. They explode with feminine power and vibrate with intoxicating details that sanctify the works. The colours roar, reflective of the mind-altering state Barton describes when perceiving the colours of our own world, in a triumphant, visual onslaught that teeters on the line between jubilation and immense vanquishing." - Exhibition text by Sophie Nankivell

Rachael Vance had the great honour of curating the first ever institutional presentation of works from the holdings of the ARNDT Collection at the Shepparton Art Museum in its new, state-of-the-art facility.

Presenting over 40 artworks from renowned international and Australian artists, this exhibition "The ARNDT Collection: From One World to Another" is a major exhibition that celebrates the pursuit of art collecting through a selection of treasures from the extensive private collection of Matthias Arndt and Tiffany Wood.

Featuring works from significant international artists, including Gilbert & George, Joseph Beuys and Pablo Picasso, alongside contemporary Australian artists, including Del Kathryn Barton, David Noonan and Ben Quilty, this exhibition sheds light on the personal passion of collecting - one that often transforms into a lifelong captivation. The show is current until the 10th of March, 2024.

Rachael Vance was delighted to curate a solo presentation of works by internationally acclaimed Danish artist Jeppe Hein for the ARNDT Collection's The Artbarn art space and grounds in Cape Schanck, Australia.

Entitled "Share Your Perspectives" This major presentation showcases a selection of pieces from the artist’s key artwork series’ that include Hein’s coloured Mirrored Balloons and appellative neon texts glowing behind two-way mirrors. This survey of works continues outside in the natural environment with a selection of large-scale outdoor sculptures from the artist's Modified Social Benches pieces staged throughout the ARNDT Collection's property in Cape Schanck, Australia.

Finding inspiration in the constant regeneration of perception, Jeppe Hein's work asks the viewer to become aware of the elemental processes that form sensory reality. Hein is widely known for his production of experiential and interactive artworks that can be positioned at the junction where art, architecture, and technical inventions intersect. Unique in their formal simplicity and notable for their frequent use of humour, his pieces engage in a lively dialogue with the traditions of Minimalist sculpture and Conceptual art of the 1970s. The artist’s works often feature surprising and captivating elements which place spectators at the centre of events and focus on their experience and perception of the surrounding space that promote positive interaction and a sense of playful engagement.

Rachael Vance was delighted to Curate the group exhibition “NIGHT WALK” at the ARNDT Collection’s Artbarn Art Space in Cape Schanck, Australia. This collection installation featured a selection of recent acquisitions from the ARNDT Collection alongside a range of international contemporary artist's works. Each artist within the show presented work that delved into immaterial spaces by unveiling and shaping alternate paradigms for existential discourse. These new spaces between reality and supposition aimed to explore our environment and what lies beyond.

In this way, the artistic positions within “NIGHT WALK” challenged physical and mental boundaries and the communication of human existence via a multitude of visual languages and unique approaches. Artists within this curation of works included: Adegboyega Adesina, Jules de Balincourt, Del Kathryn Barton, Joseph Beuys, Kirsty Budge, George Condo, Thomas Hirschhorn, Alicja Kwade, Muntean Rosenblum, Alvin Ong, Pablo Picasso, Ben Quilty, Kaloy Sanchez, Victor Ubah and Ambera Wellmann.

Rachael Vance worked on dual presentations at Cromwell Place London by Australian artists Patricia Piccinini and Ben Quilty for Arndt Art Agency. These projects have been included in the official UK/Australia Season 2021/22 programme in collaboration with the Australian High Commission, London, British Council Australia, British Council and Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

As Director of Arndt Art Agency A3, Rachael Vance worked on the major group exhibition “The Possibility is an Island” staged at Cromwell Place, London. 

This presentation highlights the emerging sphere of Southeast Asia and the surrounding Asia Pacific region; a territory known for its diverse and extremely vibrant art landscape. Central to the exhibition, the selection of artists represented within the show inhabit various sovereign states that share a common bond defined by nature: a connection to island geography.

Read Vance’s exhibition essay HERE.

Rachael Vance was invited to write an exhibition essay for the solo presentation entitled “Eloquence” by artist Lisa Roet at Craft Victoria . The show fused various media spanning film, sculpture and jewellery with specific focus on the artist’s investigations into sustainability, communication and signification.

Read the essay HERE.

Rachael Vance curated Paul Yore’s solo exhibition entitled “PATRIOT” at Michael Reid Gallery, Berlin (20 Nov - 19 Dec 2020).

For this show in Germany, Yore brings together quilted textiles, a suite of four needlepoint pieces and a spectacular suspended soft sculpture. Across the various fabric surfaces Yore’s cacophony of loaded visuals, emblems and texts embedded within the compositions speak directly to national discourse and and identity with the inclusion of the map of Australia.

Image caption: Isa Genzken, “Soziale Fassade” (2002), mirror film and coloured tape on aluminium, 70 × 100 cm

Rachael Vance curated the group exhibition entitled "RESET" for Arndt Art Agency in June 2020 that acknowledged the global scope of the current uncertainties faced by each of us during the COVID-19 pandemic while allowing new ways of seeing in response by the following artistic voices:

Jumaldi Alfi Stephan Balkenhol Joseph Beuys Sophie Calle Carla Chan Isaac Chong Wai Günther Förg Isa Genzken Uji “Hahan” Handoko Paul Hutchinson Alicja Kwade Julije Knifer Jannis Kounellis Heinz Mack Marin Majic Patricia Piccinini Sopheap Pich Chiharu Shiota Nedko Solakov Maria Taniguchi

Rachael Vance worked with Australian artist Paul Yore to present a showcase presentation at Michael Reid Berlin.

His major 4-metre textile piece “Let Us Not Die From Habit” (2018) was recently shown in the 2019 Rijswijk Textile Biennale in The Netherlands is on display until the 14th of December, 2019.

Rachael Vance has curated a solo exhibition of works by Australian artist Brook Andrew at the Australian Embassy in Berlin.  Entitled “Denkmal”, translated as “monument” or “memorial” in German, the exhibition responds directly to the artist’s research into the lack of memorials within Australia that address Aboriginal loss. This research was recently expanded upon following the artist’s 12-month artist residency at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien. The exhibition comprises sculpture, film, collage and installation that activate the Australian Embassy’s premises.

Rachael Vance’s feature in the latest issue of Objektiv “Picture Perfect part II” explores a project that put her faith back in curating: Louise Bourgeois’ solo presentation “The Empty House” (2018) that was presented at the Schinkel Pavillon, Berlin.