Reko Rennie / Australia

Kamilaroi born 1974

Reko Rennie transforms an interior void into an endless horizon line by transposing a supersized image of a desert landscape onto the NGV’s three-story elevator shaft. Written on the elevator doors are the words ‘I was always here’, a pertinent reminder of the continuing occupation of Australia by Aboriginal people. Coinciding with the fifty-year anniversary of the 1967 referendum, when 90.77 percent of Australians voted in favour of allowing Aboriginal people to be counted in the census, Home Sweet Home, 2017, advocates for the ongoing recognition of Aboriginal people through their connections with the land.

BIO

Informed by 1980s American culture, Rennie started his practice as a teenage graffiti artist, finding his voice on the surfaces of Melbourne city’s buildings, trains and laneways. Since his first solo shows in 2009, Rennie has staged seventeen one-person exhibitions of his work in Australia, Indonesia, the United States and France, and participated in numerous group exhibitions worldwide, including Personal Structures, a Venice Biennale 2017 collateral exhibition.