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From the other side | Exhibition Kit

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From the other side draws upon horror’s capacity to transgress and destabilise forms of power and oppression. The exhibition brings together works by nineteen Australian and international artists, including key new commissions. The exhibition summons the impulse for rage and revenge while embracing feelings of vulnerability and unease, it casts a lens upon feminist, queer and non-binary perspectives to consider the transgressive pleasures and liberations of horror, as makers, masters and consumers of the genre. 

Centring the fear of the monstrous feminine, the exhibition raises questions about the often-harmful representation of female monsters and how they have been reclaimed by female storytellers in recent years. The monstrous feminine resists the prototypical role of women in horror, as either victims or final girls.*The horror genre often speaks to the collective anxieties and fears of our times, from sexual liberation to new technologies, racial tension to gender subversion. Horror provides a language with which to be scared and to respond to challenges that might be beyond our control.  

Culminating in a synthesis of dread, camp, humour and catharsis, From the other side challenges the traditional narratives and assumed boundaries of the body, gender, the self and the ‘other’. 

Naomi Blacklock, Mia Boe, Louise Bourgeois, Cybele Cox, Theron Debris, Karla Dickens, Lonnie Hutchinson, Naomi Kantjuriny, Minyoung Kim, Maria Kozic, Jemima Lucas, Clare Milledge, Tracey Moffatt, Suzan Pitt, Julia Robinson, Marianna Simnett, Heather B Swann, Kellie Wells, Zamara Zamara.

Curators: Elyse Goldfinch and Jessica Clark

*final girl – the sole female survivor in slasher films

Link to Wall texts

Video of the Exhibition

  1. Introduction
  2. About the artists
    1. Minyoung Kim, The Night 2021
    2. Julia Robinson, The Pledge 2021-22
    3. Mia Boe, A Desolate Primitive Place 2023
  3. Support Material
  4. For Teachers

How to use this Kit

This exhibition kit has been written by ACCA Education to support learning alongside the ACCA exhibition From the other side. Three key artists and artworks from the exhibition have been highlighted, with discussion questions to prompt students’ thinking. Primary and secondary activities, mapped to the Victorian and Australian Curriculums, can be found in the For Teachers section.

About the artists

Minyoung Kim
born 1989, Seoul
lives and works in London, UK

Minyoung Kim’s work mirrors her innermost feelings, feelings that language fails to express. By using pencil and oil crayon on paper, she portrays, in a soft manner, ironic scenes that combine what she refers to as strange but cute elements. It’s in this ambivalence, both light and serious, that she explores and reveals her inner self.

Kim graduated from Sungshin Women’s University, Seoul, with a Bachelor in Painting in 2014. Kim currently resides in London where she completed her Master of Fine Art at the Slade School of Fine Art in 2021.

Kim’s solo exhibition Night Fever was the inaugural exhibition in Taymour Grahne Projects’ The Artist Room gallery, London, 2023. Previous solo exhibitions were held at Aout Gallery, Beirut, 2021; Place Mak, Seoul, 2016; Seogyo Art Space, Seoul, 2016; among others.

Julia Robinson
born 1981, Kaurna Country/Adelaide
lives and works in Kaurna Country/Adelaide, Australia

Julia Robinson is a visual artist working in the fields of sculpture and installation. Looking to her British ancestry as a starting point, Robinson’s work reflects an interest in folklore, pre-Christian rituals, and calendrical customs relating to the cycle of the seasons, growth and decay. She frequently employs historical costuming and sewing techniques to create artworks that sit at the intersection of folklore, ritual and folk horror, examining enduring narratives around sacrifice, sex and death. 

Since graduating from Adelaide Central School of Art, Robinson has exhibited regularly and been the recipient of several grants and awards.

Robinson lectures in the Bachelor of Visual Arts program at Adelaide Central School of Art. Her work is held in the collections of the Art Gallery of South Australia, Museum of Contemporary Art, Artbank, Tamworth Regional Gallery, and various private collections. She is represented by Hugo Michell Gallery.

Mia Boe
born 1997, Meanjin/Brisbane
lives and works in Naarm/Melbourne, Australia

Mia Boe is a painter with Butchulla and Burmese ancestry. The inheritance and disinheritance of both cultures are the focus of her practice. Boe’s paintings respond, sometimes obliquely, to historical and contemporary acts of violence perpetrated on the people and lands of Burma and Australia.

Boe received a Bachelor of Art, majoring in Art History, from the University of Queensland in 2020. In 2021, she was a recipient of the Brett Whiteley Travelling Scholarship and is a current studio artist at Gertrude Contemporary. 

Recent solo exhibitions include Going Insein, Gertrude Contemporary Glasshouse, Melbourne, 2023; Suspicion is proof enough, Sutton Gallery, Melbourne, 2023; The Trial, Sydney Contemporary with Black Art Projects, Sydney 2022; Futures Lost, Penny Contemporary, Hobart 2022; K’gari means paradise in Butchulla, CARPARK Milani Gallery, Sydney 2021; and Black Devil, Open House Collective with Blaklash Projects, Brisbane 2021.

Artists and curators at exhibition opening event, From the other side 2023, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art. L–R: Elyse Goldfinch, Heater B Swann, Dr. Clare Milledge, Karla Dickens, Dr. Jessica Clark, Kellie Wells Zamara Zamara, Jemima Lucas, Cybele Cox. Photograph: Casey Horsfield

Key Artworks

Minyoung Kim, The Night 2021; Live Drawing Books II 2018; The Grass 2021; Live Drawing Books III 2018; The Bath 2021; Staring 2021; Live Drawing Books I-III 2018; installation view, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne. Courtesy the artist. Photograph: Andrew Curtis

[clockwise from left]

The Night 2021
acrylic on paper
21 x 29.7 cm

Live Drawing Books II 2018
single-channel video 2:01 mins

The Grass 2021
oil pastel on paper
21 x 29.7 cm

Live Drawing Books III 2018
single-channel video 1:41 mins

The Bath 2021
pencil on paper
21 x 29.7 cm

Staring 2021
pencil and oil pastel on paper
29.7 x 21 cm

Live Drawing Books I 2018
single-channel video 1:45 mins
Courtesy the artist




Minyoung Kim
born 1989, Seoul
lives and works in London, UK

Key ideas and concepts: Drawing, animation, cats, dark humour

Through a selection of darkly humorous pastel drawings and hand-drawn stop-motion animations, Kim conjures dark forces and fantasies as a means of navigating the uncertainty of emotional experience. Employing a self-proclaimed ‘creepy-cute’ aesthetic, Kim’s animated Live Drawing Books I-III 2018 concoct a range of spells and potions through recurring motifs, emblems and characters. Her drawings Staring, The Bath, The Grass, and The Night, all 2021, depict black cats, bloody bodies, and staring eyes, lifting the veil on her hidden emotions, inexpressible in words, hidden deep within the subconscious, superstition, and revealed through introspection* of the self.

My canvas contains memories, anxiety, regret, desire, dreams, and everything inside me that I may not be able to express myself directly. I sincerely project myself onto the canvas. Sometimes I become a weak mermaid, a human-harming cat, and a woman with a threatening knife. Minyoung Kim

*Introspection – the examination or observation of one’s own mental and emotional processes

Discussion Questions:

    • How would you describe the mood/tone of these artworks?
    • Why do you think the artist has chosen to depict their imagery in a seemingly childlike style?
    • What is conveyed through the artist’s use of drawing materials such as pencil and oil pastel?
    • When you view this work online or in pictures, describe your emotions and thoughts and how your experience of the work changes over time.

Quick Make Idea: Turn a series of your drawings into a video animation. Choose a subject that connects with the themes in the exhibition From the other side, such as the subconscious, the feminine, or horror.

Julia Robinson, The Pledge 2021–22; Burrow Mump 2022, installation view, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne. Courtesy the artist and Hugo Michell Gallery, Adelaide. Photograph: Andrew Curtis

The Pledge 2021-22
linen, thread, scythe handles, steel, tacks, fixings, 160 x 155 x 25 cm.

Burrow Mump 2022
linen, thread, scythe handle, blade, steel, 110 x 130 x 25 cm.


Julia Robinson
born 1981, Kaurna Country/Adelaide
lives and works in Kaurna Country/Adelaide, Australia

Key ideas and concepts: Sculpture, myths, horror 

Julia Robinson’s sculptural ‘scarecrows,’ The Pledge 2021-22 and Burrow Mump 2022, from her recent series The Beckoning Blade – awaken ghosts buried deep within the soil. Each sculptural assemblage presents a splayed smocked* garment, handmade and hand-dyed by the artist, propped or framed by a repurposed and modified scythe**; a tool used to reap or harvest crops, and a symbol of death.

Grounded in the struggle for survival on the land, The Beckoning Blade series conjures notions of cults and myths, decay and renewal, and the fine line between a love and fear of nature. Together, the works materialise as a suite of frightening figures that embrace the role of harbinger*** and set the stage for sacrifice.

Using found or fabricated objects in lieu of body parts I become a sort of butcher, slicing off bits deemed irrelevant or redundant. Branches, poles or chairs may stand in for limbs, and body parts are rounded off to smooth nubs as the figurative form dissolves and is subsumed by foreign elements. Julia Robinson

*Smocked – Smocking is an embroidery technique used to gather fabric so that it can stretch. Before elastic, smocking was commonly used in cuffs, bodices, and necklines in garments instead of buttons.

**Scythe – A scythe is an agricultural hand tool for mowing grass or harvesting crops. In modern-day European-based folklore, the scythe represents the grim reaper.

***Harbinger – a person or thing that foreshadows a future event : something that gives an anticipatory sign of what is to come.

Discussion Questions

  • What kind of materials has the artist used to create these artworks?
  • Why do you think the artist chose to use clothing that has smocking and embroidery as part of its design? What does this suggest to the viewer?
  • What aesthetic qualities are expressed through the use of contrasting elements such as texture?
  • Why do you think the artist chose to depict all of these sculptures together as a series rather than presenting just one individual sculpture?

Quick Make Idea
What materials can you use to make a ‘sculptural scarecrow’?

Mia Boe, A Desolate Primitive Place 2023; I Suspect 2023, installation view, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne. Courtesy the artist and Sutton Gallery, Melbourne. Photograph: Andrew Curtis

A Desolate Primitive Place 2023
lightbox, digital print, synthetic polymer paint, 80 x 100 cm
Courtesy the artist and Sutton Gallery, Melbourne.

I Suspect 2023
lightbox, digital print, synthetic polymer paint, 80 x 100 cm
Courtesy the artist and Sutton Gallery, Melbourne.

Mia Boe
born 1997, Meanjin/Brisbane
lives and works in Naarm/Melbourne, Australia

Key ideas and concepts: Digital prints, film references, Australian history

Boe’s digitally manipulated prints, A Desolate Primitive Place and I Suspect, both 2023, are derived from two quintessentially Australian films: Wake in Fright, 1971, and Walkabout, 1971. Each work manipulates an unnerving and ambiguous scene from these classic films that convey the encroachment of the human made built environment and a frightening disconnection between people and place. Boe interrupts each scene with a strategically positioned self-portrait, inserting herself as a means to reclaim space, return the gaze, and reassert presence. 

Side-by-side, A Desolate Primitive Place and I Suspect offer uncomfortable and unembellished reflections on Australian society – both past and present – emphasising notions of alienation and racism, profanity spawned by fear of the other. 

 [At university ] I wanted to learn about other artists, other cultures and history and the politics of the time… I had always known that I wanted to make paintings which were both personal and historical. Mia Boe

Discussion Questions:

  • Why do you think the artist created these works as digital prints rather than paintings?
  • How does the artwork explore and challenge the power dynamics of our contemporary society?
  • Mia Boe’s works explore history and connection to place, why do you think it is important for Boe to explore this through art?
  • If you know the films Wake in Fright 1971 and Walkabout 1971, why do you think the artist chose to represent these films in their artwork?

For Teachers

Primary activities

Creepy sculptures 

Using a fast drying flesh coloured clay or Sculpey create your own ‘Creepy Sculptures’.
Your clay can be sundried, air dried or kiln fired if your school has the facilities.

Referencing images of real animals or the imaginary world of werewolves and vampires, create your own sculpture using their limbs as inspiration such as talons, claws, tails and eyes. 

Using your creativity, create your own sculptural form of an object which is both part animal and part human.

You may like to play with the scale and mood of your sculpture. Think about what size would make your artwork appear more or less creepy, cute or even funny. Would you prefer to make one object or multiple objects?

Extension
If firing your sculptures in a kiln, you have the potential to paint your sculpture with a variety of colours.

Australian Curriculum / Visual Arts / Years F-6

Explore ideas and artworks from different cultures and times, including artwork by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists, to use as inspiration for their own representations (ACAVAM106) (ACAVAM110) (ACAVAM114)

Use materials, techniques and processes to explore visual conventions when making artworks (ACAVAM107) (ACAVAM111) (ACAVAM115)

Create and display artworks to communicate ideas to an audience (ACAVAM108) (ACAVAM112) (ACAVAM116)

Victorian Curriculum / Visual Arts / Levels F-6

Explore and Express Ideas (VCAVAE013)(VCAVAE017) (VCAVAE021) (VCAVAE025) (VCAVAE029)
Visual Arts Practices (VCAVAV018) (VCAVAV022) (VCAVAV026) (VCAVAV030)
Present and Perform  (VCAVAP019) (VCAVAP023)(VCAVAP027)
Respond and Interpret (VCAVAR020) (VCAVAR024) (VCAVAR028) (VCAVAR032)

Curriculum Interpretation

This activity incorporates Visual Arts Learning using making and responding, drawing on the themes in the exhibition such as animal/human, horror, creepy-cute, the subconscious as a whole and the sculptural work of a number of artists in the exhibition, in particular Heather B Swann and Zamara Zamara.

By undertaking these activities, students:

  •   Experiment with embodied approaches to art making.
  •   Select and experiment with new approaches to process, composition and technical execution when creating 3D objects.
  •   Consider how an artists’ working methods contribute to the aesthetic qualities of their artworks.
  •   Analyse how an artwork develops during the process of its making in ways that were not necessarily foreseen by the artist.

Secondary activities

Digital Art – Building a Mood

Inspired by the artworks  of Minyoung Kim and Mia Boe, use digital technology to make a video work. You can use an iPad, stills, a video camera or a mobile phone to document this artwork.

STEP ONE – Think about what emotion you are trying to capture. Focus on a feelings potential aesthetic qualities, these may be hard to describe and sit in between the more exaggerated emotions such as a sense of unease, a sense of eerieness, a sense of suspense etc. What colours, shapes, textures and sounds could you use to express this mood?

STEP TWO – Think about a key character for your artworks. You may like to choose yourself, another human or an animal.

STEP THREE – Create a location as a backdrop. You may like to consider your local town, country or an imagined place. This scene/background can be either hand drawn, painted or collaged using natural or sourced material.

STEP FOUR – Consider a short story and a couple of actions and objects which will feature in your video work 

STEP FIVE – Once you have developed your scene, use lighting and movement to document your story. If using a stills camera, document each movement you make to your scene so that when you combine them they will look like a stop-motion video. 

It can be 10 seconds long or a couple of minutes depending on the mood you are creating. 

Materials
Recording device (eg iPad, camera etc)
Pens, pencil, paint, collage materials, natural found objects.

Extension
Consider how you would present your artwork to further emphasise your chosen mood. Would you project it large onto a wall, would you put it on a TV, in a small box or outside at night? Would you use sound?

Australian Curriculum / Visual Arts / Years 7-10

Experiment with visual arts conventions and techniques (ACAVAM118) (ACAVAM125)
Develop planning skills for art-making by exploring techniques and processes used by different artists  (ACAVAM120) (ACAVAM127)
Practise techniques and processes to enhance representation of ideas in their art-making (ACAVAM121) ​​ (ACAVAM128)

Victorian Curriculum / Visual Arts / Levels 7-10

Explore and Express Ideas (VCAVAE033)(VCAVAE034)(VCAVAE040)(VCAVAE041)
Visual Arts Practices (VCAVAV035) (VCAVAV042)(VCAVAV036)(VCAVAV043)
Respond and Interpret(VCAVAR039)(VCAVAR046)

Curriculum Interpretation

This activity incorporates Visual Arts Learning using making and responding, drawing on the work of Minyoung Kim and Mia Boe. These works explore digital technology, drawing, painting and Australian history as discussed previously. Students will construct their own digital artwork. 

By undertaking this activity, students:

  •   Experiment with scale, size and materials.
  •   Select materials which they interact with in an everyday way to develop a video artwork.
  •   Consider the possibilities of how an artists’ working methods contribute to the aesthetic qualities of their artworks.
  •   Develop knowledge about how digital artworks are made for exhibition.

Contact ACCA

This education resource has been produced by ACCA Education to provide information and classroom support material for education visits to the exhibition From the other side. The reproduction and communication of this resource is permitted for educational purposes only.

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