The Yellow Peril, reimagined 2016

Summary

Melbourne-based artist Natalie Thomas has a diverse practice that ranges over graphic and mixed-media works, performance and more, with storytelling and writing increasingly central. Between 1999 and 2005, she was part of the dynamic duo nat&ali, and more recently her ratbag critique of mass media and contemporary culture is assembled and accessed through her online social archive, Natty Solo.

In 2008, the Art and Heritage Collection acquired three works on paper by Thomas and one on fabric. The works on paper engage with local icons of different sorts – Ron Robertson-Swann’s public sculpture ‘Vault’, the National Gallery of Victoria and Young and Jacksons hotel – and the screen-print on fabric engages with a more ubiquitous symbol of the times, the photocopier. This particular work by Thomas was acquired for the collection in 2016, and again it focuses on ‘Vault’, reimagining the work. The works were purchased from Andy Mac’s Until Never Gallery, described as being ‘for outside artists and iconoclastic artists’. Andy Mac ran the Citylights Project for many years and was the de facto curator of Hosier Lane, notable for its street art.