Franca Barraclough: The Visitors

Presented by Araluen Arts Centre

Franca Barraclough’s The Visitors is a visual survey of people, paths and stories woven through the sociological landscape of contemporary Central Australian culture, a distillation of poignant local imagery harnessed to give an artistic account of the impacts and influences on desert life. The making of these large–scale photographs involves Barraclough engaging, choreographing and collaborating with a diverse range of local community members in unique, inimitable and immersive experiences. Reproduced with all the gloss of tourism advertising, each image is alluring but also documents the particular pressure of living in Central Australia, the combination of extreme weather, remoteness and culture-clash against a backdrop of ancient, powerful landscapes. These works speak to the ‘push and pull’ of living here, of belonging and not belonging, of a landscape that simultaneously repels and holds, emotionally and psychologically.