The Western lens has historically dominated museum collections, with a focus on Eurocentric art and history. This perspective has excluded and marginalised the voices, histories, and artistic traditions of First Nations culture. Kimberley Moulton, Adjunct Curator Indigenous Art Tate Modern/Senior Curator RISING Festival Melbourne, leads a discussion about the shift in museums globally as they rethink collections to challenge this bias that has shaped the art world for centuries.
Presented in partnership with the Victorian First Peoples Art & Design Fair.
This talk will take place in the CONVERSATIONS space at Melbourne Art Fair.
Moderator: Kimberley Moulton, Yorta Yorta, Adjunct Curator Indigenous Art Tate Modern/Senior Curator RISING Festival Melbourne
Speakers: Tamsin Hong, Exhibitions Curator, Serpentine London; Erin Vink, Curator, First Nations art (local and global), AGNSW; Nathan Pōhio, Senior Curator Māori at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, and Co-Vice President of Te Ūaka Lyttleton Museum; Kimberley Moulton, Yorta Yorta, Adjunct Curator Indigenous Art Tate Modern/Senior Curator RISING Festival Melbourne
Kimberley Moulton, Yorta Yorta, Adjunct Curator Indigenous Art Tate Modern/Senior Curator RISING Festival Melbourne
Kimberley Moulton is a Yorta Yorta woman based in Melbourne originally from Shepparton, Country Victoria. She is an accomplished Senior Curator and writer and the Adjunct Curator Indigenous Art for the Tate Modern London and Senior Curator at RISING, Melbourne’s international arts festival. Kimberley previously held curatorial roles at Museums Victoria (2009-2023) and was the Senior Curator South Eastern First Peoples collection at Museums Victoria (2016-2023). Her practice works with knowledge, histories, Ancestral memory and futures at the intersection of historical collections and contemporary art. Her work is located within the rethinking global art histories, expanding on what inclusion, exhibitions and research in and out of institutions can be for First Peoples communities and artists more broadly. She is currently a PhD candidate in curatorial practice with the Wominjeka Djeembana Indigenous Research Lab Monash University, Deputy Chair of the Board Shepparton Art Museum and member of the board for the Adam Briggs Foundation. In 2025 she is curator of the Tarrawarra Biennale.
Tamsin Hong, Exhibitions Curator, Serpentine London
Tamsin Hong is a contemporary international art curator based in London. Hong’s research interests include women’s knowledge systems and embodied practices. Born on unceded Ngunnawal Country, Hong is Exhibitions Curator at Serpentine working on the upcoming exhibition Georg Baselitz: Sculptures 2011-2015. She was formerly Assistant Curator of International Art at Tate, specialising in performance and working on African and Australian acquisitions. While at Tate Modern, Hong co-curated the land-rights exhibition, A Year in Art: Australia 1992 and performances including Lee Mingwei’s Our Labyrinth, Ei Arakawa’s Mega Please Draw Freely and the 2020 Live Exhibition, Our Bodies, Our Archives.
Erin Vink, Curator, First Nations art (local and global), AGNSW
Erin Vink is a Ngiyampaa curator and writer living and working on Gadigal ngura, and currently works as Curator, First Nations art (local and global) at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. Her recent curatorial projects at the Gallery and across wider institutional contexts include Daniel Boyd: Treasure Island (2022-23, co-curated with Isobel Parker Philip), The National 2021: New Australian Art (2021, co-curated with Matt Cox), Exposure: Native Art and Political Ecology (2021-23, the Museum of Contemporary Native American Arts, Sante Fe) and For our Country (2019, Australian War Memorial, Canberra). Vink is an alumnus of the National Gallery of Australia’s prestigious Indigenous Arts Leadership program supported by Wesfarmers Arts, and she currently serves as the chair of Art Monthly Australasia (2022-). Her writing has been published extensively.
Nathan Pōhio, Senior Curator Māori at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, and Co-Vice President of Te Ūaka Lyttleton Museum
Nathan Pōhio (Waitaha, Kāti Mamoe, Kāi Tahu, Ngāti Kahungunu, Tau Iwi) is Senior Curator Māori at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, and Co-Vice President of Te Ūaka Lyttleton Museum. Pōhio worked at Te Puna o Waiwhetū Christchurch Art Gallery from 2002 – 2021, where he curated, He Rau Maharataka Whenua: A Memory of Land with Ta Tipene O’Regan in a cultural advisory role; researched and co-curated Te Wheke: Pathways Across Oceania and Ralph Hotere: Ātete, to Resist. Pōhio focused on supporting Ngāi Tahutanga within the gallery’s internal culture and built relationships between his mana whenua whanau and the gallery, he increased Māori art and artist presence within the exhibition program and gallery collections. Pōhio researched and curated Te Puna Waiora: The Distinguished Weavers of Te Kahui Whiritoi. In February 2022 Pōhio took up his role at Toi o Tamaki Auckland Art Gallery. Projects to date include, Toi Te Kupu: Whakaahuatanga an important two-day hui on Māori art, and co-curated Ever Present: First Peoples Art of Australia, with Tina Baum, Curator of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art at the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra.
To attend this talk, purchase a ticket to Melbourne Art Fair here.