ACMI, in an Australian exclusive, will present a major exhibition of more than 70 works from the national collection of British art institution, Tate.

Light: Works from Tate’s Collection premieres as part of the Victorian Government’s Melbourne Winter Masterpieces series. Curated by Tate, UK and drawing from its prestigious collection, Light features over 70 works spanning 200 years of art history including painting, photography, sculpture, drawing, kinetic art, installation and the moving image.

Light celebrates groundbreaking moments as artists from the past 200 years have captured or harnessed light in their work – from Joseph Mallord William Turner and Claude Monet to James Turrell and Tacita Dean. All are connected by their fascination with the qualities of light as both material and subject.

The challenge of capturing this phenomenon has spurred artists across time to develop innovative techniques and inspired moving image makers, who use light and shadow as the building blocks of their craft. French artist, filmmaker and writer Jean Cocteau said: “Cinema is the form of modern writing whose ink is light.”

Featured artists include the original and, in his time, radical ‘painter of light’ J. M. W. Turner, whose epic 1805 painting The Deluge will be seen for the first time in Australia alongside paintings by John Constable, Wassily Kandinsky, Bridget Riley, Joseph Albers, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, and Alfred Sisley.

Other works include Olafur Eliasson’s rotating crystalline sculpture Stardust Particle (2014); Yayoi Kusama’s The Passing Winter (2005); James Turrell’s Raemar, Blue (1969) and Tacita Dean’s 16mm film Lost at Sea (1996).

Light is also flanked by two major, free exhibits. A major new commission by contemporary Australian artist Mikala Dwyer will be displayed in ACMI’s lightwell. Featuring a cluster of monumental transparent plastic forms suspended high above visitors’ heads, the work explores materiality, open ended narratives and the play of light.

A program of talks, film screenings, performances, workshops and late-night events will accompany and extend the ideas explored in the exhibition, including masterclasses with leading cinematographers, performances, artist talks, magic lantern and 16mm presentations and more.

Originally curated for the Museum of Art, Pudong in Shanghai, Light: Works from Tate’s Collection comes to ACMI from Buk-Seoul Museum of Art, Korea.

The exhibition will take place in ACMI’s Gallery 4 as a ticketed event, with free programs built around it throughout ACMI spaces, including Gallery 3.
Light: Works from Tate’s Collection opens at ACMI on 16 June 2022.