How do we say what we need to say, and who’s listening? Are we making sense? What’s the point in trying?
Image: Direct, Directed, Directly installtion view Samstag Museum of Art 2025. Photograph by Sia Duff.
Direct, Directed, Directly
Friday 28 February — Friday 30 May 2025
Samstag Galleries 1, 2 & 3
Richard Bell (Kamilaroi, Kooma, Jiman and Gurang Gurang) / Madison Bycroft / Kuba Dorabialski / Danielle Freakley / Christine Sun Kim and Thomas Mader / Monte Masi / Chunxiao Qu
Direct, Directed, Directly takes communication — speaking directly, speaking indirectly, looking for meaning, double meanings and breakdowns — as a point of departure.
Installed across the two levels of Samstag Museum, Direct, Directed, Directly draws together Australian and international artists working across performance, moving image, installation and sound. The exhibition dives into the gap between what is said and what is heard. Ranging from the theatrical to the philosophical, the works invoke gesture, translation and language to broach the difficulties of communicating. How do we say what we need to say, and who’s listening? Are we making sense? What’s the point in trying?
Communication is a two-way process that can succeed, sometimes, but can also fail spectacularly. Direct, Directed, Directly is an exhibition that believes that, amid the inherent frustration, futility and misunderstandings, there is catharsis to be found in the humour and absurdity of our attempts to connect.
Upcoming Events
Monte Masi: Everybody’s Dream (had almost come true)
Thursday 29 May — 6 pm
As Direct, Directed, Directly draws to a close, join us in the gallery for Monte Masi’s performance, Everybody’s Dream (had almost come true).
Masi and a cast of collaborators will seek out the chaos in consensus. Riffing on jazz phrasing, stock characters, the fever of big ideas and the thud of failure, they ask us: does everyone having a say mean everyone getting their way?
The first work in Masi’s 2025 Ephemeral Commission series, this piece of ‘mime in the expanded field’ rounds out Direct, Directed, Directly, an exhibition that captures the humour and frustration of trying to communicate.
