Wayne Crothers is Senior Curator at the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) specializing in Asian Art. He lived in Japan for more than 18 years during his early career and devoted himself to Asian art research. After completing a Master of Fine Arts at Tama Art University, Tokyo, Crothers worked as a lecturer at Tokyo’s Musashino Art University for six years and lectured at Australian National University, Canberra; Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, China; Lafayette College, Pennsylvania, USA and the Joan Miro Foundation, Spain as a guest professor (The National Gallery of Victoria 2021). Wayne Crothers started to work with the NGV in 2010 where he participated in curating a series of influential exhibitions about Asian art as a Senior Curator including Hokusai (2017), Terracotta Warriors: Guardians of Immortality and Cai Guo-Qiang: The Transient Landscape (2019) and the Great Wave and Japanese Modernism (2020). By discussing the above three significant exhibitions curated or mainly curated by Wayne Crothers, this essay will analyse his curatorial methodologies which are valuable in our future curatorial career.
NGV senior curator of Asian art Wayne Crothers. Photography: Eddie Jim
As an art gallery with a history of more than one hundred years, the National Gallery of Victoria’s collection at present has more than 75,000 pieces and Asian artworks are also an important part of collections. Most exhibitions curated by NGV Asian Art curatorial group are completed using collections in
the NGV, so the curatorial methodology of reinterpreting collections is one of their outstanding techniques when curating. To reinterpret collections of a national gallery is also to interpret human cultures and histories. Deliss et al. (2012) note that to “remediate” (Rabinow, 2008, cited by Deliss et al., 2012, p.21) collections is to expand original knowledge by interpreting in the current context involving literature, anthropology, fashion and visual art. This indicates that when curating past works we can integrate new cognitions with existing meaning. Japanese Modernism is an exhibition of NGV’s recent acquired collections last year, and 190 pieces of objects in this exhibition were shown in Australia for the first time (Flux 2020). In this exhibition, two sub-themes of Moga (modern girls) and Mobo (modern boys) with paintings, artefacts and printmaking tie together the entire exhibition. Wayne Crothers is the lead curator of Japanese Modernism, and Annika Aiken is the assistant curator in this exhibition who started her curatorial career in the year 2019. Crothers (2020) explains the reason for selecting girls and boys as two main parts in his article that they represent the beginning of modernity in Asia.
Installation view of Japanese Modernism at National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne Photography: Courtesy of NGV / Tom Ross
Annika Aiken (2020) notes that paintings of Moga characters reference the tradition and also represent the modern fashion. The design of Moga’s clothing is very avant garde and their possessions as well as images on paper show
the prosperity of the society. On the other side of the space, the sub-theme of Mobo emphasizes Japanese samurai culture and nationalism during the 1920s to 1930s through the group of modern boys. Collections appearing in this part are also in plain and sombre colour which also imply a chequered history. Curators review the history from today’s perspective that Moga is the representative of Japanese modernism and women’s social status has been regarded as equal to men since then. However, in the other main part of the exhibition curators reveal the reality of a chaos stage after the 1930s due to the severe earth and the Allied bombing. The contrastive narrative making of both flourishing and disastrous collections frees up curating and what exhibits are intrinsic (Martinon 2015, p.28). This also means that the exhibition evades the traditional chronological curatorial method and thus create a more attractive path.
Moga part of Japanese Modernism Photography: Courtesy of NGV / Tom Ross
Mobo part of Japanese Modernism
Photography: Courtesy of NGV / Tom Ross
In addition, exhibits in Japanese Modernism are curated as curiosity cabinets which including artefacts in cabinets, and relics of modern girls and boys. The relationship of diverse objects requires to be reorganized and to “create new pairings” (Stafford et al. 2001). Deliss et al. (2012) also point out the importance of “adding new context to what we know” when curating. By gathering multidisciplinary-related collections spanning paintings to fashion, history to sociology, this unfamiliar era is reinterpreted in a creative way and the exhibition leads audiences to a new area of knowledge and culture. As the NGV gallery director Tony Ellwood’s (2020, cited by Bensley 2020) review of the exhibition, “Japanese Modernism offers exclusive insight into an era of Japanese art that is yet to be widely discovered by Australian audiences.” In general, the exhibition reinterprets collections in an effective way and provide opportunities for Australian audiences to access a period of history in another continent.
Curiosity cabinets of Japanese Modernism
Photography: Courtesy of NGV / Tom Ross
The experience of living in Japan for more than ten years makes Crothers have an abundance of knowledge of Japanese culture and history. However, the success of the Japanese exhibition is more than because of the requirement of knowledge accumulation, but also need a transposition of a different cultural background. Besides Japanese Modernism,Hokusai and the Great Wave is another typical Japanese exhibition curated by Wayne Crothers at NGV in 2017. Collaborating with the Japan Ukiyo-e Museum, Hokusai and the Great Waveexhibited 176 featuring works from the NGV and Ukiyo-e Museum’s collections in the entire career of Katsushika Hokusai (The National Gallery of Victoria 2017). The materials of works in this exhibition are various and the amount of works is large which almost covers the artist’s whole career. When facing these disordered collections, Crothers again didn’t follow the boring linear approach of curating. This time he created a unique journey of Hokusai and Japan. As he said, “We've spent a lot of time thinking about how to show these works in an innovative way, drawing attention and imagination to engage with the works, and to create a journey – in this case, a journey back to 19th-century Japan.” (Crothers 2017, cited by Northover 2017) The book Object atlas: fieldwork in the museum byDeliss et al. (2012) also argue that we cannot exhibit other cultures in terms of our cultural community. This means that when handling collections from different cultures we should try to stand in another cultural context. Wayne Crothers (2020, with Jameson) once stated in an interview saying that “we can never truly know another person's story until we walk in their shoes.” The methodology of transposition thinking has been applied in many of Crothers’ intercultural curatorial practices and it is worth for young curators to learn from when dealing with unfamiliar collections.
Inside the exhibition room of Hokusai
Photography: Courtesy of NGV / Tom Ross
Wayne Crothers not only brings different cultures to Australia but also brings historic objects to the contemporary art world or combines the history and the present together. Terracotta Warriors & Cai Guo-Qiang is a joint exhibition presenting Chinese culture and art in the history and in contemporary art world. The National Gallery of Victoria cooperated with Shanxi History Museum in China to present more than 150 treasures from the Chinese Qin dynasty (221-207 BCE) as well as Cai Guo-Qiang’s contemporary artworks using multiple traditional Chinese materials such as porcelain, silk and gunpowder (The National Gallery of Victoria 2019). The mixture of the past and the present has obviously broken the boundaries between traditional and contemporary art curating, and it also reminds us to rethink the way of curating. Most artworks of Cai Guo-Qiang are large installations that create an immersive exhibition environment for audiences. Wayne Brothers (2019) talked about the original intention of combining two different kinds of artworks is because of audiences. Since objects of Terracotta Warriors are from unknown and remote history for Australian visitors, the NGV International and the curator want the exhibition more attractive and let more people take the initiative to understand history. Martinon (2015, p.27) critics that considering the audiences after artists and the curator will lead to a failing exhibition. This indicates the importance of paying attention to audiences for curatorial practices. Therefore, from numerous positive feedbacks of Terracotta Warriors & Cai Guo-Qiang, putting the audiences in a primary position is very essential when curating.
The poster of Terracotta Warriors & Cai Guo-Qiang
Courtesy of NGV
Although it seems that the two concurrent exhibitions have no relevance to each other, the curator proves the close relationship between these two exhibitions by his curatorial process. The artworks of Cai Guo-Qiang being selected in this exhibition are mostly inspired by ancient Chinese sites where has a similar age with Terracotta Warriors. Wayne Crothers (2018, cited by Francis 2018) regards this dual exhibition as a dialogue between history and the present. The artist Cai Guo-Qiang (2019) also defines the two exhibitions as “rivers of time separated by two millennia”. This kind of ingenious connection method across time and space makes the curatorial content more reasonable and impressive. Muller (2021) states in her lecturer that the desire to seek innovation and to create new things rather than just conserve collections is crucial for a curator. This indicates that the process of curating requires creation and imagination to link the objects to the theme of the exhibition. Thus, curatorial practices can also be a new creation of artworks as well as history.
Murmuration (Landscape) by Cai Guo-Qiang at National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Photography: Courtesy of NGV
The terracotta army from Qin dynasty (221-206 BCE) in Terracotta Warriors: Guardians of Immortality
Photography: Sean Fennessy and Tobias Titz
In conclusion, this essay discusses Wayne Brothers’ methodologies of curating through analysing three different exhibitions separately. These three exhibitions are all in the National Gallery of Victoria International and their collections are related to Asian culture and history. From the exhibition of Japanese Modernism(2020), Wayne Brothers weaves a narrative of Moga and Mobo using multidisciplinary materials and create attractive cabinets of curiosity to make the unfamiliar period of history alive. In the curatorial practice of Hokusai (2017), Wayne Brothers stands in the position of Japanese culture to review the history of a master. In the most interesting exhibition Terracotta Warriors & Cai Guo-Qiang, Wayne Brothers shows his care for audiences and the innovation of connecting different artworks. As young curators, every method of Wayne Brothers is worth learning and exploring in our future curatorial practices.
References
Bensley, Tili-Nettheim 2020, ‘Japanese Modernism at the NGV’, Australian Design Review, 5 March 2020, accessed 15 April 2021, < https://www.australiandesignreview.com/architecture/japanese-modernism-at-the-ngv/ >
Brothers, W 2020, ‘Japanese modernism: between earthquake and war’, The National Gallery of Victoria, 26 February 2020, accessed 15 April 2021, <https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/essay/japanese-modernism-between-earthquake-and-war/>
Deliss, C, Beck, H & Elliott, F 2012, Object atlas: fieldwork in the museum, Kerber Verlag, Bielefeld, Germany.
Flux, E 2020, ‘Postponed: Japanese Modernism’, Broadsheet Media, accessed 10 April 2021,<https://www.broadsheet.com.au/melbourne/event/japanese-modernism >
Francis, H 2018, ‘Terracotta warriors march towards Melbourne with a bang’, The Sydney Morning Herald, 17 December 2018, accessed 15 April 2021, < https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/terracotta-warriors-march-towards-melbourne-with-a-bang-20181217-p50mpo.html >
Jameson, J 2020, ‘Art curator Wayne Crothers: What travel taught me’, Traveler, 28 February 2020, accessed 12 April 2021, < https://www.traveller.com.au/art-curator-wayne-crothers-what-travel-taught-me-h1lzad >
Japanese Modernism Tour, 2020, picture recording, The National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 30 June,<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urlSrQDCiI8 >
Martinon, Jean-Paul 2015, The Curatorial, Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, London.
NGV interview with Wayne Crothers, 2019, radio, The National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 24 September, <https://omny.fm/shows/art-smitten/ngv-interview-with-wayne-crothers#description >
Muller, L 2021, Care and Curiosity: Introduction to Contemporary Curating, University of New South Wales, Sydney.
Northover, K 2017, ‘Katsushika Hokusai at NGV: the Japanese artist who swept the world’, The Sydney Morning Herald, 13 July 2017, accessed 10 April 2021, < https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/the-japanese-artist-who-swept-the-world-20170713-gxah63.html >
Stafford, BM, Poggi, I & Terpak, F 2001, Devices of wonder: from the world in a box to images on a screen, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, CA.
The National Gallery of Victoria 2017, HOKUSAI, The National Gallery of Victoria, accessed 10 April 2021, <https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/exhibition/hokusai/ >
The National Gallery of Victoria 2019, Terracotta Warriors & Cai Guo-Qiang, The National Gallery of Victoria, accessed 12 April 2021, <https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/exhibition/terracotta-warriors-cai-guo-qiang/ >
The National Gallery of Victoria 2019, Terracotta Warriors Guardians of Immortality & Cai Guo-Qiang The Transient Landscape Exhibition Labels, accessed 18 April 2021, < https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Labels_TerracottaWarriors_Cai-Guo-Qiang-ordered.pdf >
The National Gallery of Victoria 2021, Australia, Melbourne, accessed 10 April 2021, <https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/program/asia-society-x-ngv-faith-art-the-legacy-of-confucianism-across-asia/ >