Sydney International Art Series: Tacita Dean

A Turner Prize nominee, filmmaker and painter, British artist Tacita Dean is one of the biggest names in the contemporary art world. In a Sydney exclusive, you can experience the largest exhibition of Dean's work ever seen in the southern hemisphere at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia until Sunday, March 3, 2024.

Tacita Dean, The Wreck of Hope, 2022, credit Zan Wimberley, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, 2023, image courtesy the artist

Tacita Dean is part of the Sydney International Art Series this summer, which brings works by internationally renowned artists to museums in Sydney every year (and also includes a major Kandinsky retrospective and a comprehensive showcase of works by Louise Bourgeois).

Curated by MCA Director Suzanne Cotter and Senior Curator of Exhibitions Jane Devery, the exhibition features new and recent works, including many previously never seen Down Under. Tacita Dean showcases the artist's diverse practice and artistic range, encompassing film, drawing, photography, printmaking and collage across themes such as chance, memory, history and time.

Touching down from Paris for the first time in Australia is Dean's film installation Geography Biography, described by the artist as an 'accidental self-portrait.' This significant new work sits alongside monumental chalk drawings The Wreck of Hope and Chalk Fall, which delve into climate change and the fragility of our planet.

Another notable highlight is a group of works that resulted from the artist's designs for The Dante Project — a collaboration with choreographer Wayne McGregor and composer Thomas Adès for The Royal Ballet in London. Central to this presentation is Paradise: a mesmerising 35mm Cinemascope film shown in the ballet's final act.

Tacita Dean, Paradise (film still), 2021, with music, Paradiso by Thomas Adès, 35mm colour anamorphic film, image courtesy the artist, Frith Street Gallery, London and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York, Paris and Los Angeles, © the artist

Suzanne Cotter shares, "Tacita Dean is undoubtedly one of our greatest living artists and truly an artist that speaks to our contemporary moment. Aesthetically seductive and scintillating in its intelligence, her work is a profound and poetic response to the world as visual sensation and as a metaphor for time – a historical, geological and phenomenal – and the interconnectedness of people, places and things."

Tickets are $25 for adults, $18 for concession and free for those 17 and under. Or, if you want to explore the expansive exhibition for free, hit up the MCA on Wednesday, January 31. The gallery is waiving the entry fee for everyone for this one day. Just head over to Circular Quay between 10am–5pm — no booking required.

The exhibit was made possible with the support of the NSW Government through its tourism and major events agency, Destination NSW.

Buy tickets and find out more at the MCA's website.

Top images: Tacita Dean, The Wreck of Hope, 2022, credit Zan Wimberley, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, 2023, image courtesy the artist; Tacita Dean, Geography Biography, 2023, Bourse de Commerce - Pinault Collection, 2023, image courtesy Pinault Collection, © Tadao Ando Architect & Associates, Niney et Marca Architectes, agence Pierre-Antoine Gatier, photograph credit: Aurélien Mole; Tacita Dean, Sakura (Jindai II), 2023, installation view, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, 2023, image courtesy the artist and Frith Street Gallery, London © the artist, photograph credit: Zan Wimberley; Installation view, Tacita Dean, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, 2023, image courtesy the artist, Frith Street Gallery, London and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York, Paris and Los Angeles © the artist; Tacita Dean, Paradise (film still), 2021, with music, Paradiso by Thomas Adès, image courtesy the artist, Frith Street Gallery, London and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York, Paris and Los Angeles, © the artist; Tacita Dean, Geography Biography, 2023, installation view, image courtesy Pinault Collection, © Tadao Ando Architect & Associates, Niney et Marca Architectes, agence Pierre-Antoine Gatier, photograph credit: Aurélien Mole