John Toohey: Terra

JOHN TOOHEY- TERRA
29 May - 21 June 2025 | Albany Town Hall

Terra is a solo photographic landscape history of Western Australia, based around three narratives, South Land, Blood and Bone and Basin and Range. At its core is the evidence, depicted through panoramic images and text panels, of the reconstruction of landscape since colonisation as a cultural act (hence the pun in the title).

Basin and Range tells a story of the landscape from deep time to the present through panoramic sequences. These split frame scenes combine a reading of both time and space in the one image, extending from the early formation of the landscape to the present. South Land recasts the coastlines the Dutch named in the seventeenth century, De Witt’s Land, Eendrachts Land, D’Edel’s Land, Leeuwin Land, and Nuyts Land. These were names given to parts of the coastline that had been charted but were essentially imagined as the Dutch seldom made landfall. Leeuwin Land and Nuyts Land belonged to the coast between Cape Naturaliste and the border with South Australia, encompassing King George Sound, though nothing in surviving documents indicates that either expedition was close enough to the coast to enter the Sound. The landscapes are reimagined through a series of panoramas, snapshots and postcards. Blood and Bone challenges the standard depiction of early settlers as resilient in the face of hardship, recasting the history through acts of violence and madness reported through the press.

Open 29 May - 21 June 2025

Albany Town Hall - 217 York St Albany

Tuesday - Saturday 10-5pm

You may also like the following events from City of Albany Arts & Culture:

• This Tuesday, 17th June, 10:00 am, Karlee Bertola- A Celebration of Pollination in Albany
• This Tuesday, 17th June, 10:00 am, Allen Kennedy | Beyond the Surface in Albany
• Next month, 1st July, 09:30 am, The Art Room in Albany

Also check out other Trips & Adventurous Activities in Albany.