Between Space and Abstraction

2026 Australia Taiwan Imagery & Cultural Exchange

This exhibition, curated by Melody Chen, brings together Australian and Taiwanese artists to foster cultural exchange and greater understanding between the two countries. It is also an opportunity to celebrate the multicultural character of contemporary Australia through art.

Australian-based artists
Renata Buziak · April Giblin · Yumiko Kigoshi · Andrea Moser · Szczepan Urbanowicz

Taiwanese artists
Chen Huimin · Chen Meizhu · Huang Tiankai

Biochrome Textiles

My Gondwanan Biochromes explore the space between seeing and knowing. Developed during my artist residency at Binna Burra Cultural Landscape, within the rainforest of Lamington National Park, the works emerge through a collaboration between rainforest plants, analogue photographic materials and natural processes over extended periods.

The resulting images move between representation and abstraction, transforming botanical forms into luminous landscapes that may evoke geological formations, flowing water or microscopic worlds. The work speaks a visual language before revealing its botanical origins, inviting viewers to pause, look closely and question what they are seeing.

As the plants gradually reveal themselves, curiosity becomes a pathway to connection. The works encourage moments of presence and wonder, inviting reflection on our relationship with the living world, place and the environments we create around us.

Created through the interaction of time, organic matter and microbial activity, each biochrome records transformation, bringing together art, observation and natural processes.

Artist-in-Residence at the Binna Burra Cultural Landscape*

Immersed in the rainforest, I drew inspiration from Gondwanan lineage plants and worked with their forms and qualities through the biochrome process. I collaborated with local palaeobotanist Dr Ray Carpenter, who remarked:

 “… nowhere else on Earth is there such a rich representation of vegetation with links to ancient Gondwanan floras …”

The biochrome images emerge through a collaboration between plant material, photographic materials and natural processes, with each work shaped by transformation over time.

Together, the works invite us to pause and consider our place within the rhythms of the living world and the unique ecological heritage preserved within these landscapes.

*Binna Burra is located in the Scenic Rim, nestled within the World Heritage Gondwana Rainforests of Australia, at Woonoongoora (Lamington National Park), Yugambeh region.

In her essay Time, Transition and Transformation: Renata Buziak’s Gondwanan Biochromes Dr Lisa Chandler wrote:

“Renata Buziak’s intriguing biochrome images take us on a metaphorical journey into the Gondwana rainforests surrounding Binna Burra – a rich environment containing plants with lineages that can be traced back to the ancient supercontinent of Gondwana. Buziak’s work provides a fresh perspective on this complex ecosystem, helping us distinguish and learn about individual plants, and revealing their connection to a wider ecology and its ongoing cycles of growth and decay that stretch back over 50 million years – before the continents of Australia and South America separated from Antarctica. But perhaps what is most surprising about Buziak’s biochromes is that the plants themselves are vital collaborators in the creation of these fascinating images.”

(L. Chandler, Art. Nature. Science. at Binna Burra, 2022).

Gondwanan Biochromes Online

You can view most of the works in this exhibition in my Portfolio page: Gondwanan Biochromes.

Six works are currently exhibited at the Temple, with selected works also available through my online Store.

I look forward to seeing you at the exhibition, or connecting with you online. I’ll be sharing updates, images and videos during the exhibition on my social media, so please follow along.