Extra-Aesthetic: Twenty-Five Views of the Monash University Collection

Dates:
1 December 2005 – 25 March 2006

Artists:
James Angus, Howard Arkley, Bashir Baraki, Chris Barry, Kate Beynon, Terri Bird, Pat Brassington, Ian Burn, Stephen Bush, Alison Burton, John Brack, Arthur Boyd, John Campbell and Tim Jones, Kevin O’Connor, Adam Cullen, Destiny Deacon and Virginia Fraser, Merilyn Fairskye, Diena Georgetti, Simryn Gill, Francisco de Goya, Brent Harris, Louise Hearman, Kitty Kantilla, Leah King-Smith, Maria Kozic, Rosemary Laing, Richard Larter, John Longstaff, Elwyn Lynn, Fiona McDonald, Bea Maddock, Roy de Maistre, Conrad Martens, Tracey Moffatt, Callum Morton, Clive Murray-White, John Neeson, Rose Nolan, Sidney Nolan, David Noonan, Susan Norrie, John Perceval, Patricia Piccinini, Neil Roberts, Tom Roberts, Robert Rooney, Jeffrey Smart, Ricky Swallow, Edwin Tanner, Imants Tillers, Peter Tyndall, Savanhdary Vongpoothorn, David Wadelton, John Walker, Lyndal Walker, Guan Wei, Roy Wiggan, Fred Williams, Anne Zahalka, Constanze Zikos

Curators:
Max Delany and Kirrily Hammond

Location:
Monash University Museum of Art
Ground Floor, Building 55
Monash University, Clayton Campus

For Extra-Aesthetic: Twenty-Five Views of the Monash University Collection, twenty-five academics from diverse disciplines across the University were invited to select and write about works from the collection. The exhibition provided a vivid representation of the range of research occurring at Monash, and the depth and breadth of the Monash University Collection.

The exhibition involved some of the most intriguing thinkers across the University, including leading experts across the humanities and sciences, offering new perspectives on the collection, which has been a leading representation of contemporary Australian art since the 1960s. Then MUMA Artistic Director Max Delany explained: ‘Extra-Aesthetic comprises twenty-five mini-exhibitions, selected by leading academics at Monash, who have been given carte-blanche to explore the collection from the standpoint of diverse disciplines, from cyber culture to cloning, history to psychoanalysis, information technology to artificial intelligence, Indigenous studies and the law, among others.’

To coincide with the exhibition, MUMA published an extensive catalogue, featuring participants’ responses to the works, with an introductory essay by MUMA’s Assistant Curator–Collection and exhibition co-curator, Kirrily Hammond.

Exhibition Catalogue:
Extra-Aesthetic: 25 views of the Monash University Collection

^{Image: Fred Williams, Portrait of Sir Louis Matheson 1976, oil on canvas. Monash University Collection, Melbourne. Commissioned 1976}