Relive the Triennial Opening Weekend ... or catch what you missed

'The 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art' Opening Weekend

'The 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art' Opening Weekend / View full image

From incredible performances, to captivating artist talks and intriguing panel topics, 'The 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art' Opening Weekend had it all. Sit back and relive the excitement with this series of videos.

Until 27 April 2025, the Triennial spans both the Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art, and includes new and recent work by artists from Australia, Asia, the Pacific. This 11th edition of the series builds on more than three decades of close engagement with the region, reflecting its social and cultural diversity through the contributions of more than 200 artists and creators. Don't miss the exhibition or you'll have to wait three years for the next.

Performance

Triennial artist Etson Caminha's performance featured Vaihoho polyphonic singing unique to the Fatuluku people of Lospalos in Timor Leste. Evolving over many years, Caminha’s practice brings together sound and visual art in dynamic performances, a form of living art.

Triennial artist Joydeb Roaja's performance features the plung, a traditional flute played by the Mro people, one of the eleven different indigenous peoples who live in the Chittagong Hill Tracts in south-eastern Bangladesh. Present in many of Roaja’s drawings, paintings and performances, the plung is a symbol of unity and resistance in the fight for the recognition and land rights of Indigenous people in Bangladesh.

Experience a performance of song, stories and dance by Kawaki within their immersive audiovisual installation in the Triennial. Over one year and four months, women from Katupika, Wagina and Kia communities in the Solomon Islands collaborated with Dreamcast Theatre, a collective based in the capital, Honiara to create this artwork and accompanying performance which celebrates Kawaki’s ongoing caretaking of natural resources which are vital to the continuation of these communities’ distinctive cultural practices.

The Sounds of Brisbane 2024 is a collaboration between Okui Lala, QAGOMA and West End State School, commissioned for Asia Pacific Triennial Kids.

Artist Talks

Triennial artists Kawita Vatanajyankur and Pat Pataranutaporn talk about about their new collaborative performance work, The machine ghost in the human shell 2024 which employs AI and a holographic ghost to engineer a choreographed dialogue between human and machine.

Triennial artist Albert Yonathan Setyawan talks about his slip cast ceramic installation Spires of Undifferentiated Being 2023–24. This work consists of more than 3000 individual ceramic objects consisting of two symbols, a flame and a hand — that explore the process of creating the work itself, as well as Setyawan’s philosophy of his practice.

Triennial artist Salima Saway Agra-an talks about her ‘Cultural fragility’ series and her practice of painting with ochres made from the soil of her ancestral lands in Bukidnon, Southern Philippines.

Triennial artist Eleng Luluan talks about her large-scale installation Sin ka nadruma, Kay paka balribalrthi, Kay apa pelaela, Ku ki dredreme (The immutable spiritual beliefs) 2024 which draws on the Rukai concept of wabacabacas, where the movement of the hand embodies thoughts, beliefs, history and culture.

Triennial artist Muhlis Lugis talks about his large-scale woodcut artworks which explore Bugis community customs, teaching, tradition and philosophy.

For many artists, ancestral stories, place and culture are vital to their expression and the materials that they use in their practice. Triennial artists Salima Saway Agra-an, Sancintya Mohini Simpson, and Lê Giang discuss their artworks that share unique deep connections to land, culture and artistic practices that have been passed down through generations.

How do unique histories of lived experience and shared collective memory shape and enrich our understanding of the world and of each other? Triennial artists Zac Langdon-Pole, Sheelasha Rajbhandari, and Hit Man Gurung discuss their artworks that share in the mining of the past and recontextualising of histories to create a renewed vision of the future, the wonders of the world and our place in it.

'Re-imagining the workplace' is developed collaboratively by Ana Estrada, Nasrikah and Okui Lala. The event gathers caregivers to share perspectives on their complex occupation and to collectively rethink its possibilities. These include migrant domestic workers from Indonesia based in Malaysia, and aged care workers based in Brisbane.

Art that brings us closer
Asia Pacific Triennial
Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art
30 November 2024 – 27 April 2025
Free entry

Related Stories

  •
    Read •

    The Asia Pacific Triennial & returning friends

    The Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art held at the Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art since 1993 is, as its name suggests, a celebration of contemporary art from Australia, Asia and the Pacific. With this significant exhibition series now in its 31st year and 11th chapter, the QAGOMA Research Library is releasing a relational database which provides researchers with the ability to explore the interconnectedness of the ever-growing list of individuals, groups and projects which are part of the Triennial’s history. The database provides access to the Asia Pacific Triennial Archive by way of the involvement of individual contributors ranging from exhibiting artists, performers, collaborators, curators, authors, interlocutors, and others to key Gallery staff. In developing this database, the Library aims to transform ongoing access to the archive by providing an interactive resource that fosters further learning, scholarship, and engagement with the Asia Pacific Triennial exhibition series. To mark the 11th Asia Pacific Triennial (30 November 2024 – 27 April 2025) and the release of the Triennial Archive database, the Library is highlighting its documentation of eight artists who are exhibiting in this year’s Triennial and who are also past participants. Philippines artist Julie Lluch (b.1946), who exhibited her painted terracotta sculpture Doxology 1993 (illustrated) in the first Triennial in 1993, is returning this year together with her daughter, Kiri Dalena (b.1975), who exhibited the photographic series Erased slogans 2015 (illustrated) in the eighth Triennial in 2015. This year, the two artists are part of the Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago: Roots and Currents multi-artist project which focuses on contemporary art practices from the island of Mindanao and the nearby Sulu Archipelago region located in the southernmost part of the Philippines. Julie Lluch Kiri Dalena In the second Triennial (27 September 1996 – 19 January 1997), Aotearoa New Zealand artist Brett Graham (Ngāti Korokī Kahukura, Tainui b.1967) exhibited Kahukara 1995 (illustrated) and Tekohao o te ngira 1995 (illustrated), as part of the Pacific men’s waka collective in the Queensland Art Gallery’s Watermall. The concept of the waka (‘vessel’ in Māori), often used in Aotearoa New Zealand to illustrate the country’s cultural diversity, also became a metaphor in the second Triennial for the histories, voyages and migrations of the Aotearoa New Zealand and Polynesian peoples. For this Triennial, Graham is presenting five sculptures which speak to structures created by both British and Māori during the New Zealand wars. Brett Graham Also returning to the current Triennial is Mai Nguyễn-Long (b.1970), who participated as a researcher and interpreter for the second Triennial (27 September 1996 – 19 January 1997), visiting Vietnam on a research trip and translating for the Việtnamese artists while they were in Brisbane for the Triennial. For the 11th Triennial, Nguyễn-Long is exhibiting her ‘Vomit Girl’ sculptures (illustrated) which reflect her conflicted sense of identity and belonging growing up as an Australian-born daughter of a Vietnamese father and Australian mother and living in Papua New Guinea and the Philippines. Mai Nguyen-Long Jumping forward to the sixth Triennial (5 December 2009 – 5 April 2010), Việtnamese artist Bùi Công Khánh (b.1972) exhibited as part of The Mekong (illustrated), a project which featured works by eight artists from different generations working in Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Việt Nam, and Laos. These works tapped into social and political change, the importance of religion and traditional values, memories of brutal histories, and responses to everyday experience. For the current Triennial (illustrated), the artist is showing a group of new, large-scale vases alongside his first venture into film, a tribute to the ceramic village where he works. Bùi Công Khánh Nepalese artist Hit Man Gurung (b.1986) whose work Yellow helmet and gray house (from ‘I have to Feed Myself, My Family and My Country’ series) 2015 (illustrated), in the eighth Triennial (21 November 2015 – 10 April 2016) draws attention to the thousands of workers departing Nepal for substandard conditions on development sites in the Persian Gulf has returned for the 11th Triennial as a co-curator with Sheelasha Rajbhandari of the regionally co-led project TAMBA, a survey of work by Nepalese artists, activists, and indigenous communities. Hit Man Gurung For eighth Triennial (21 November 2015 – 10 April 2016) Nomin Bold (b.1982), was one of four young contemporary Mongol zurag painters showing Labyrinth game 2012 (illustrated) and Tomorrow 2014 (illustrated)). Her deep connections with Mongolia’s cultural heritage continues in her current work for this Triennial, Life cup 2023, in collaboration with Ochirbold Ayurzana (b.1976). Nomin Bold Finally, in our list of returning artists, we have Alex Monteith (Clan Mitchell, Clan Monteith b.1977) who participated in the tenth Triennial (4 December 2021 – 25 April 2022) as part of the ACAPA Pasifika Community Engagement Project (ACE), with the work Kā Paroro o Haumumu: Coastal Flows / Coastal Incursions 2012 (illustrated), an ongoing transdisciplinary art project that reconsiders landscapes and material removed from middens associated with tauwhare (shelters) and other sites throughout Te Mimi o Tū Te Rakiwhānoa (Fiordland) coastal and marine areas of New Zealand’s South Island, Te Waipounamu. In the 11th Triennial, Monteith is participating in He Uru Mānuka, He Uru Kānuka 2024, a collaborative installation by AWA (Artists for Waiapu Action) Alex Monteith Since its inception in 1993, the Asia Pacific Triennial has significantly shaped the art landscape in Brisbane and beyond. Its commitment to highlighting the dynamism of contemporary art practices has fostered a greater understanding and appreciation of diverse cultural expressions from across our region. As the Triennial series continues to evolve and grow so will the Asia Pacific Triennial Archive held in the QAGOMA Research Library. With the archive now more accessible through the newly developed database, a treasure trove of diverse stories, experiences, contributions, and effects can be explored from individual perspectives. This enhanced access aims not only to illuminate the narratives of past Triennials but also to encourage researchers to delve into the wealth of resources preserved in...
  •
    Watch •

    Watch as Kikik Kollektive paint their vast GOMA mural for the 11th Asia Pacific Triennial

    Amongst the bustle of streets, marketplaces and public settings of Iloilo on Panay Island, street-side murals by Kikik Kollektive can be found. The works are deeply engaged with local community and bring attention to social and environmental issues through a localised lens. Kikik use their large-scale murals to present these issues ‘as a means to preserve the past and be an active instigator in the dialogue for decolonisation’. ‘Kikik’ comes from the word for cicada in Hiligaynon, a language spoken in rural areas of Iloilo Province. For the collective, the insect’s loud chatter is symbolic of how the artists stimulate dialogue and exchange in the community. For the Asia Pacific Triennial, Kikik Kollektive celebrates significant stories of Iloilo in a vast mural 'Tul-an sang aton kamal-aman (Bones of our elders)', honouring the indigenous culture of Panay through a tribute to local figures, community traditions, ancient cultivation practices and spiritual beliefs. Seventy artists, collectives and projects from more than 30 countries feature in the eleventh chapter of the flagship QAGOMA exhibition series, the Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art. Bringing compelling new art to Brisbane, the Triennial is a gateway to the rapidly evolving artistic expression of Australia, Asia and the Pacific. The Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art is QAGOMA's (Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art) flagship exhibition series. Video that gives you voice 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art 30 Nov 2024 – 27 Apr 2025 Queensland Art Gallery & Gallery of Modern Art Free entry https://www.qagoma.qld.gov.au/apt11 Kikik Kollektive, Iloilo province, The Philippines, est. 2017 Kristine Buenavista, The Philippines b.1984 Marrz Capanang, The Philippines b.1986 Marge Chavez, The Philippines b.1991 Noel Epalan Jr, The Philippines b.1988 Tul-an sang aton kamal-aman (Bones of our elders) 2024 Synthetic polymer paint Commissioned for ‘The 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art’ Courtesy: The artists This project is supported by the Commonwealth through the Office for the Arts, part of the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts. Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia © Queensland Art Gallery Board of Trustees, 2025 https://www.qagoma.qld.gov.au #qagoma