For the duration of Make Yourself at Home, our Project Space will host a new installation Gadigal, Bidjigal and Wiradjuri artist Nadeena Dixon. She is a master weaver, well known for her weaving of cultural objects and materials such as dilly bags and fishnets.

Dixon’s work blends natural materials that are collected with her family with ready-made, found objects. The installation will expand Dixon’s traditional weaving practice to present digital, video and installation experimentations.

The Project Space presentation will feature a 4-channel video animation depicting local animals and plants that interpret visual narratives of identity and experiences on Country – Gadigal Country. This work is informed through memory and connections between the saltwater and freshwater regions of Sydney, and connects cultural and experimental practices.

Accompanying the video animations, Dixon also extends the storytelling of land and water onto the gallery walls with an illustration using coconut twine and emu feathers which were found on her Country. Dixon tells of growing up and learning to innovate and use any materials found on Country to communicate significant cultural stories and concepts. The coconut twine is mixed in local ochres and attached with emu feathers.

Dixon’s work in the Project Space communicates old knowledges through new means, demonstrating the multidisciplinary practices of contemporary First Nations storytelling.