Simone Biles enters the 2019 World Gymnastics Championships already with the most all-around gold medals ever. The greatest of all time, she has changed the sport forever.
Changes to superannuation legislation have had a cooling effect on arts investment in recent years. Image: An old bee farm (c. 1900) by Clara Southern.
National Gallery of Victoria
Don’t blame the global financial crisis. The Australian art market has performed poorly over the last decade - but there is plenty of growth potential.
There are memorial stones scattered along songlines throughout the Australian landscape, victims and transgressors transformed into rock following epic struggles to stand as cautionary tales.
A black marlin in the sea. These apex predators can grow to 800 kilograms.
shutterstock
A giant ocean fish swims into the heart of industrial Port Kembla looking for food. What if we take its presence, a few km from an ancient, living midden, as a symbol of both new and old ways to learn in the age of the Anthropocene?
The large book bearing a handwritten English label, ‘The Holy Koran’, was not a Quran, but a 500-page volume of Bengali Sufi poetry.
Samia Khatun
For decades, a book wrongly identified as ‘The Holy Koran’ was kept at a mosque in Broken Hill. Who was the unnamed traveller who brought Bengali stories of the prophets to the Australian desert?
Dennis Altman in Santa Cruz California in 1984,
Author provided
When Matthew Condon began writing about corruption in Queensland he discovered that members of his own family had cameos in the narrative.
Whitlanders in the 1940s. Established in 1941 near the base of Victoria’s Mount Buffalo, this Catholic community celebrated the ‘dignity of manual labour’ and was led by a charismatic athlete and former judge’s associate, Ray Triado.
Joe Pisani
Long before 70s hippies and hipster artisans, Australians were seeking solace by going back to the land. They ranged from anarchists to suffragists to Catholic agrarians.
Arthur Loureiro, Study for ‘The spirit of the new Moon’ 1888, oil on canvas.
Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane Purchased 1995. Queensland Art Gallery Foundation Grant with the assistance of Philip Bacon through the Queensland Art Gallery Foundation. Celebrating the Queensland Art Gallery's Photograph: QAGOMA
50 years after Apollo 11, a new exhibition considers artistic responses to our celestial neighbour. As we retreat from human space exploration, our relationship to the moon has become virtual.
An advertisement for breast implants in Sydney in 2015. Advertisements often promote a ‘natural’ ideal of beauty, even when advocating surgical intervention.
Paul Millar/AAP
Many historic ideas about women’s beauty - from prizing firm breasts to emphasising the ‘natural’ - continue to resonate today.
Michelle Guthrie in 2018: the former ABC managing director made greater staff diversity a top priority. But her final Equity and Diversity annual report failed to meet several long-held targets.
Joel Carrett/AAP
As we face a growing tide of unregulated hate speech, the media is crucial in normalising diversity. Yet progress here has been slow. Even the ABC has failed to meet some of its own targets for hiring a diversity of employees.
Dame Edna Everage at Melbourne Town Hall in 2006 after being presented with the Key to the City.
Simon Mossman/AAP
Public taste has changed and that is that. It’s not just the references that date in topical satire. Audiences are powerful, and if they feel insulted they can shut down a comedian.
For poet John Kinsella, veganism is an ethics of commitment. Living as a vegan, he writes, is not a holier-than-thou situation, but a move towards being more respectful of life.
China’s five-storey Tianjin Binhai Library occupies an area of 33,700 square metres with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves which can contain up to 1.2 million books.
Roman Pilipey
In our world of pervasive consumerism, libraries continue to be founded on humanism. Their core purpose as accessible places is vital – yet they are also now popular tourist destinations.
Beauty YouTuber James Charles recently made numerous apology videos following a public feud. Such videos are now so common they have become the subject of parody.
Nina Prommer/EPA/AAP
From Steve Smith’s tearful apology to anonymous apps like Whisper, public confessions can be therapeutic, emancipatory, or potentially exploitative.
In Avengers: Endgame, Clint Barton (aka Hawkeye) experiences insurmountable loss. Perhaps his grief represents our fear of making sacrifices to save the planet.
Marvel Studios/IMDB
Although not pitched as one, Avengers: Endgame is an environmental movie. But in reality, we need to face our fears and find solutions, rather than perpetuating the fantasy of regressing into the past.
US actor Kevin Spacey is escorted into Nantucket District Court in January for arraignment on a sexual assault charge. His lawyers entered a plea of not guilty on his behalf.
CJ Gunther/EPA
Honorary (Senior Fellow) School of Culture and Communication University of Melbourne. Editor in Chief, Design and Art of Australia Online, The University of Melbourne