Discover: Young Talent at our Brisbane Fair

Affordable Art Fair Brisbane is proud to introduce its much-anticipated Discover: Young Talent platform. This dynamic platform showcases artists who have been carefully chosen for their remarkable creativity and fresh perspectives in the art world.

Uncovering hidden gems, the platform provides collectors with a unique opportunity to acquire artworks from emerging artists before they inevitably soar to great heights. This handpicked selection encompasses a diverse range of mediums and styles, promising an exciting discovery for every visitor. The Discover: Young Talent platform is not to be missed at the upcoming Affordable Art Fair Brisbane during your visit this 9 – 12 May.

SAM HARRISON

Sam Harrison is a Brisbane based artist and curator with cultural connections to Kamilaroi and Wiradjuri people of Central NSW. He has worked in a number of creative capacities, as an exhibiting artist, curator, artist assistant and arts teacher for young adults with autism.

With the belief that an artist’s role is to research and understand the morals, motives and circumstances that inform identity, Harrison’s practice explores the hypocrisies and idiosyncrasies of local, national and global histories to find stories that are worth telling.

Sam Harrison has been working as one of Richard Bell’s painting assistants for over three years. During this time they have also had the opportunity to work with Megan Cope, Gordon Hookey, Judy Watson, Tony Albert and Eric Bridgeman.

Before starting full-time work as a visual artist, they were a project officer for Blaklash Creative, co-curating two large exhibitions for Brisbane City Council’s outdoor gallery, Hyperlocal and OUTstanding.

RENEE KIRE

Renee received her Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours in 2022 and has had three solo exhibitions throughout Brisbane since. She has been recognised as a finalist in the 2023 Fisher Ghost Art Award and the 2021 National Graduate Showcase at PICA.

Renee Kire‘s artistic practice uses sculpture and installation to revise the Minimalist agenda from a feminist perspective. By employing the aesthetic simplicity of Minimalism, Kire’s work toys with perspective and conflated dimensions, subverting our preconceptions about how objects and materials behave.

Renee Kire’s body of work, ‘Rearrangeable Perceptions,’ will be a featured installation at this year’s fair.

‘Rearrangeable Perceptions’ is an ongoing exploration of the ‘masculine’ aesthetic commonly associated with Minimalism. By examining Minimalism through a contemporary feminist lens, these pieces aim to contribute to a feminist interpretation of art history. Through the manipulation of wood into forms considered ‘feminine and soft,’ this body of work seeks to challenge our preconceptions about material behaviour and mental perception. In doing so, it opposes the minimalist mantra of ‘What you see is what you see’. 

SUNDAY JEMMOTT

Sunday Jemmott is a Meanjin-based artist concerned with the expression of play. Their work examines how the purposeful mobilisation of trivialised aesthetics can reframe the devaluing of play in art history and current culture.

They graduated from the Queensland College of Art with First Class Honours 2021. By harnessing the unfixed nature of play through abstraction, multi-disciplinary painting, high key colour and immersive installation, Jemmott’s work illustrates how visual play can offer a reclaimed sense of joy in contemporary art.

In 2023, Sunday Jemmott had their first solo exhibition with local organisation, Nextdoor ARI at The 4217, Surfers Paradise. The exhibition “Hullaballo”, took cues from eight crocheted blankets made by her great-grandmother. By re-embodying each blanket through abstraction and expanded painting methods, the work reflects on personal family lineage, queer identity, and the storytelling capacity of craft.   

SIENA STUBBS

As a young Yolŋu woman, Siena Stubbs grew up in the community of Yirrkala NT surrounded by family and culture. This connection to culture has driven her creative capabilities and a desire to collaborate with other creatives. In 2023, Sienna graduated from the Queensland University of Technology, Bachelor of Fine Arts, with Distinction.

Siena’s love for photography stemmed from an early fear of losing her most prized possessions. At eleven years old, the uncertainty of digital storage in ‘the cloud’ worried her. Immediately, she wanted to return to the days when memories were stored in photo albums in cupboards. This led to her Aunty gifting her an old Nikon P510 camera, which developed into a fascination with taking bird photos and later the creation of her first book, ‘Our Birds: Ŋilimurruŋgu Wäyin Malanynha’ published by Magabala Books.

In August 2020, Siena’s short film ‘Shinkansen (2020)’ was awarded the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander – Multimedia Prize. In 2020, she produced and filmed a story that featured in ABC TV’s ‘Lockdown Stories’, sharing the methods Siena’s community adapted to prevent the spread of COVID-19 to their region.

This year’s Discover: Young Talent exhibition will see Siena expanding her practice through a series of cyanotype photographs. Cyanotype, a cameraless technique for capturing imagery, is a new and exciting chapter for this rising star.

ZOE WILLEY

Zoe Willey is an emerging artist currently based in Brisbane. She works primarily in oil paint to depict a variety of subject matter including landscapes, house portraits and still-life scenes. She employs a painterly style at an intersection between impressionism and realism. This allows her to convey both the tangible and intangible elements of the places and moments she captures.

JADE PEARL

Jade Pearl is a 28-year-old Kalkadoon aspiring freelance artist creating art on Dala / Jinabarra country, which is the beautiful hinterland of the Sunshine Coast. She creates abstract acrylic art that pays homage to her ancestry, quirky personality and the colour within her heart. 

She hopes to portray the melting pot of herself in each of her pieces with maximal colour and funky flow to inspire joy and to celebrate First Nations people, past, present and future.

This line-up of young artists is a must-see, so don’t forget to purchase your tickets! We hope to see you 9 – 12 May at the Brisbane Showgrounds Exhibition Building.

Main image: Renee Kire, Rearrangeable Perceptions (2023)