Catch The International Debut Of Tourmaline: Transcendent And rea:claimed This Summer
When: 12 December 2025 to 15 March 2026
Where: Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, 111 Sturt Street, Southbank VIC 3006
Website: acca.melbourne
r e a: c l a i m e d and Tourmaline: Transcendent
ACCA’s summer season is bringing two powerful exhibitions to Melbourne, and they sit right at the heart of what queer art can do when it is given space to breathe, question, and connect. rea: claimed and Tourmaline: Transcendent run side by side, yet each offers its own emotional charge. Together, they open a conversation about identity, history, resistance, and the joy that continues to grow in queer and trans communities despite the weight of the world.
The Australian Centre for Contemporary Art has a long relationship with rea, a Gamilaraay, Wailwan and Biripi digital media artist whose work has shaped Indigenous new media practice for more than three decades. They first showed at ACCA in 1994 as part of the landmark exhibition Blakness: Blak City Culture. More than 30 years later, the gallery is hosting a focused survey of their work, tracing a practice that has moved through photography, video, sculpture, installation, and text-based new media.
rea: claimed brings together major works from across their career along with a global premiere of a new installation titled tRAKa tRAKn (burra beedee). The work has been years in the making and continues their commitment to examining the ties between land, memory, politics, violence, and the lived experience of queer Indigenous bodies. The exhibition acknowledges the ongoing impact of colonisation, speaking to missionisation, dispossession, linguicide, Stolen Generations, and current crises such as Indigenous youth suicide and the destruction of sacred Country. It also marks the release of the first full monograph on rea’s practice, featuring writing by respected curators and academics.
Courtesy the artist and ChapterNY.
Running in tandem is Tourmaline: Transcendent, the first Australian solo exhibition from the American filmmaker, artist, activist, and writer whose work has become deeply important to Black, trans, and queer audiences around the world. Tourmaline’s practice blends archival footage, self portraiture, and cinematic storytelling to centre queer history and Black trans resilience. Many visitors will recognise her name from recent appearances at the Whitney Biennial, MASP and Tate Modern.
At ACCA, Tourmaline introduces three bodies of work. The Transcendent photo series features large-scale images shot in Venice. These portraits sit comfortably within a long tradition of self-representation while pushing it toward a more expansive, dreamlike space. The video work A Flower That Lives Forever makes its global debut, and Pollinator returns after its first showing at the Whitney Biennial, weaving archival footage with Tourmaline’s own images to honour trans lives through a more fluid and sensory form of biography.
Much of Tourmaline’s recent work has been shaped by her long standing research into Marsha P Johnson. Her new book, MARSHA: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson, offers the first full biography of the activist whose presence stretched from the Stonewall riots through the height of the AIDS epidemic. The exhibition echoes this care and attention, inviting viewers to sit with beauty and imagination as necessary practices of survival.
Both exhibitions feature public events. Opening celebrations take place on Thursday 11 December. rea will hold an artist talk and book launch on Saturday 13 December. Tourmaline will be in conversation with curator Sophie Prince on Thursday 22 January 2026. All events are free.
For full details and upcoming events, visit acca.melbourne.
