2. Biography
• Born in1967, Innisfail, Queensland.
• Part of the Kuku Yalandji, Waanji,
Yidinji and Gurgu Yimithirr peoples.
• Holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts from
the Queensland College of Art.
• He has held a number of public
exhibitions both as a part of a group
and an individual, and has his work in
various collections around Australia
and the world.
• His Chinese name is the
legacy of his paternal
great-grandfather – his
family knows little
about that side of their
history.
• He currently lives and
works in Queensland.
3. Vernon Ah Kee’s Cultural
Background & Practice
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdIcl99hKx4)
4. Ah Kee’s Art Practice
• At the core of Vernon Ah Kee‘s practice is a constant and provocative
investigation of race, colour and politics.
• Ah Kee‘s intention is to reference past racial atrocities and the way
they resonate and reverberate in the present.
• Ah Kee has two dominant strands to his material practice –
monumentally scaled pencil portraits of his family members who
gaze defiantly at the viewer, and text-based works – slogans which
are beautiful, pithy and poetic, while hitting hard.
• Sardonic, satirical and wry humour, biting and black, aerates the
slogans.
• He is also now creating hard-hitting text-based video works and
installations that have incorporated surfboards cast as ceremonial
shields, and most recently paintings.
5. Ah Kee’s Art Practice
• Ah Kee‘s artistic practice is informed and produced within the
urban context from Aboriginal experience of contemporary
life.
• His work explores Australian Indigenous and non-Indigenous
culture in contemporary society.
• Vernon Ah Kee creates work dealing with issues facing
Australian Indigenous culture in a post-colonial society.
• His art is primarily a critique of Australian popular culture,
specifically the Black/White divide.
6. Use of Text
• Ah Kee held his first solo show, If I Was
White at Metro Arts in 1999.
• Ah Kee began his practice with his text
works, informed by his interest in the text
art of Barbara Kruger and the radical
feminist Guerrilla Girls that first piqued
his interest in the use of typography, as
well as text as used in advertising imagery.
•
• These works use the direct effect of text
whilst creating abstract shapes through a
play with kerning and positioning.
• Ah Kee states, "Text is immediate. If
there's something you want to say - write
it‖.
• (kerning is the process of adjusting the
spacing between characters in a word,
usually to achieve a visually pleasing
result.)
If I was white (2002). Inkjet print on
polystyrene board on polyvinyl
chloride (238 x 137cm). Edition 1/5.
7. The ‘gaze’.
• In 2008 Vernon Ah Kee exhibited in
the Biennale of Sydney a series of 12
charcoal and mixed media drawings
on canvas that continued his series
of portraits of his family.
• The focus of each subject is their
gaze - the way they look back at the
viewer. This is designed to cause the
viewer to feel a sense of discomfort,
as the confrontational act of the
stare is strongly felt.
• As previously, the drawings are a
response to the anthropological
romanticised historical portraits of
Aboriginals and effectively reposition
the Aboriginal in Australia from
something that is in a museum to
modern day people living real and
contemporary lives. George Sibley (2008). Charcoal, crayon
and acrylic on canvas (180 x 240cm).
Eddie Ah Kee (2008). Charcoal, crayon
and acrylic on canvas (180 x 240 cm).
8. Next week…
We will be looking at some of his artworks and series.
Vernon Ah Kee is the second artist that you must use in your
Cultural Warriors Essay, and therefore, just like with Fiona Foley,
we will be selecting three artworks from the works discussed
next week to look at during Week 6 to help you write your essay.
Remember, your draft is due Week 6 - try to have a full
document ready to send me, and I can provide you with
feedback and assistance!
