Acclaimed artist Danie Mellor explores Australia’s shared history with a powerful solo exhibition at QAGOMA
Multidisciplinary artist Danie Mellor is showcasing historical ‘truths’ in a new light through a profound and visually arresting body of work at QAGOMA. On display until Sunday August 3, the marru | the unseen visible exhibition invites audiences to experience and reflect on the relationship between First Nations people, culture and Country, and the environmental and social impact of colonial history.
Through the lens of his Ngadjon-jii, Mamu and Anglo-Celtic ancestry, and enduring connection to Country in the Atherton Tablelands and rainforests of far north Queensland, the acclaimed Danie Mellor uses painting, photography and moving image to meld archival and contemporary source imagery. With Country at the core of Mellor’s practice, he positions landscape not only as a subject, but as a repository for historical narrative, experience and understanding – a space where past, present and future converge. Mellor’s recomposed scenes challenge the authority of historical pictorial records and the narratives embedded in colonial-era photography. Together, the thought-provoking works prompt viewers to explore the role images have in shaping collective perceptions of history and memory.
The exhibition title ‘marru’ translates to ‘becoming visible’ in the Dyirbal language of Mellor’s matrilineal ancestors, and speaks to a shift in perception – offering new ways of looking at, understanding and visualising what has long been unseen or obscured in Australia’s history. Mellor’s monumental work resists fixed interpretation – instead, he invites audiences to narrate the scenes and construct their own meanings and truths. This stylistic choice gives viewers the freedom to explore hidden histories of the Colonial settlement in Australia through numerous lenses of experience and understanding. In doing so, viewers are subtly prompted to question their own interpretation of the image – and ask how our cultural conditioning and understanding of history has created the ‘story’ we imagine.
Experience Danie Mellor’s marru | the unseen visible at QAGOMA until Sunday August 3. For more information, head to the QAGOMA website.
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This article was written in partnership with our friends at QAGOMA.
Image one: Danie Mellor / Ngadjon-jii/Mamu peoples / Australia b.1971 / Dark star waterfall (still) 2025 / Two-channel video projection: 16:9, colour, sound, 24 minutes; historic footage and images: National Film and Sound Archive of Australia, Queensland State Archives, State Library of Queensland / This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its arts funding and advisory body through a VACS Major Commissioning project / Courtesy: The artist and Tolarno Galleries, Melbourne / © Danie Mellor
Image two: Danie Mellor / Ngadjon-jii/Mamu peoples / Australia b.1971 / On the edge of darkness (the sun also sets) 2020 / Acrylic on board with gesso and iridescent wash / 180 x 360cm / Private collection / © Danie Mellor
Image three: Danie Mellor / Ngadjon-jii/Mamu peoples / Australia b.1971 / The remembering (forever in history) 2024 / Acrylic on linen with gesso and iridescent wash / 152 x 275cm / Courtesy: The artist / © Danie Mellor