The NBA Gallery: Inside Sydney’s latest immersive pop-up exhibition
The NBA has long been a driving force throughout pop culture, particularly in Australia in recent years.
Whether it’s through music, fashion, sport or the arts, there’s no denying that the American League has become a huge part of Australian pop culture, which Sydney’s newest pop-up exhibition, the NBA Gallery, aims to celebrate.
The NBA Gallery is an immersive experience that pays homage to Australia’s impact on the NBA and the NBA’s impact on Australia.
NBA Gallery
Witnessing an NBA game can evoke an amazing array of emotions. It is designed to observe a magical act, a dance, a game of chess and the fastest decisions known to man.
In the 75 years of the National Basketball Association’s existence, the North American professional basketball league has grown bigger than just the game itself; it is a culture, a phenomenon and for some a way of life.
The NBA’s presence is global, as is the composition of its players.
Australia is among the most represented countries with more than 30 Australian players in the history of the league.
Australia’s past and current NBA players have been featured collectively or individually in artwork by Sonny Day, Noah Johnson, Kris Andrew Small and Scott Marsh.
Other artists engaged in more abstract or materially literal dialogues with the NBA; as in works by Serwah Attafuah, Roman Jody, Nike Savvas, Alexandra Hackett (aka Miniswoosh), and Dennis Golding.
Allow these nine artworks by nine Australian artists from multiple generations and backgrounds to broaden your perspective on the game and reflect on the tremendous impact Australia has had on the league’s legacy.
location
The NBA Gallery takes place in Sydney, NSW and is located at the legendary Central Station in the entertainment complex called EDDY:
CENTRAL STATION
STORES 4-7, 1 EDDY AVENUE
HEUMARKET NSW 2000
opening hours
Open daily from Friday, August 19, 2022 – Wednesday, August 31, 2022, from 11:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.
Artist
Nike Savvas
Nike Savvas is an Australian artist living between Sydney and London. As a trained painter, she works across scales and materials and creates numerous large-scale installations for Toi Art Te Papa Wellington NZ, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; Auckland Art Gallery NZ, Australian Center for Contemporary Art, Melbourne; Camden Arts Centre, London; Artspace Sydney, IMA Brisbane, Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles, Leeds Art Gallery, UK, and the Southbank Center in London.
Inspired by a variety of sources, from op art to kitsch, her work often fuses meticulously crafted detail and complex mathematical algorithms, while simultaneously drawing attention to the tangible and the abstract. Her objects and installations often invite the viewer to participate in the active experience of her work, physically shifting, repositioning and refocusing their gaze to reveal ever-changing facets of the works. Her art is never entirely ‘stable’, rather Savvas creates alluring, swaying objects that captivate and mesmerize the eye and mind
Scott March
Scott Marsh is one of Australia’s most famous and notorious street performers. With a long history in graffiti culture, he is internationally known for his distinctive, politically inspired and newsworthy murals.
From marking trains in Sydney 12 to being a finalist in both the Moran Portrait Prize and the Archibald Prize, Scott confronts popular perceptions of street art and graffiti, using traditional art techniques to prove that fine art goes beyond oil and canvas can exist and be successful.
While some of his interpretations may be controversial, the overwhelming majority of Australians admire and encourage his work, with each piece drawing crowds of viewers and transforming mundane buildings into shrines of hope, resilience and social change.
Scott’s work has made headlines around the world with his iconic plays like Kanye Loves Kanye, Saint George, Trump Obese Turtle, Merry Crisis and A Symbol of Pain and Frustration.
Dennis Goldig
Dennis Golding is a Kamilaroi/Gamilaraay artist, curator and collaborator based in Sydney. His practice reclaims Aboriginal history and identity by sharing his personal experiences and childhood memories from growing up in Sydney’s Redfern.
Golding critiques the processes of colonialism in Australia using a range of media to inspire new conversations about historical, social, political and cultural narratives.
Kris Andrew Small
Sydney-based Kris Andrew Small’s work is a joyful explosion of colour, typography, pattern and collage. He often takes social issues and channels them through loud and abstract images. That’s not to say his work is hard, although his portfolio is indeed one of utter exuberance.
This idiosyncratic fusion of techniques and themes can be found in a variety of mediums, from posters to campaigns, packaging, zines and everything in between, and has led Kris to work with clients such as Nike, Apple, Dazed, Die Zeit, Adidas Originals and It’s Nice That has worked with Channel 4, WeTransfer, Reebok and more. He has also exhibited internationally at institutions such as the V&A in Dundee and MAD at The Lourve, Paris.
At the heart of his vigorous and dynamic work is a message of empowerment and support for the LGBTQIA+ community and resistance to the hypermasculine society he experienced as a youth.
He finds solace in all facets of his identity and reality through creation and encourages others to do the same. Inspired by artists like Keith Haring and Jean-Paul Goude, artists who shaped his perception as a creative, he uses his practice to uplift and educate, giving a voice to those unable to use their voice.
His often abstract patterns and illustrations contain messages of acceptance and self-love, to stay true to yourself and to let that guide you in your artistic vision.
Noah Johnson
For his fashion label ONEOFONE ARCHIVE, Noah uses second-hand clothes, fabrics and leftover materials to create new, timeless garments.
One man’s trash to another man’s treasure is practically as much as one could say, and Noah hopes to continue providing people with ‘slow fashion’ in response to fast fashion and the overproduction/consumption of large corporations.
And so everything Noah makes is one of one.
mini swoosh
Alexandra Hackett is a multidisciplinary designer in the streetwear and sportswear industries specializing in fully reconstituted and upcycled product design.
Her practice revolves around the process of deconstruction, exploring non-traditional fabrications and functionalities.
Serwa Attafuah
Serwah Attafuah is a multidisciplinary artist and musician from Dharug Land/West Sydney, Australia. She creates surreal cyber dreamscapes and heavenly wastelands populated by Afro-futuristic abstractions of the self with strong ancestral and contemporary themes.
Serwah has worked with and been engaged by clients such as Mercedes Benz, Nike, GQ, Adobe, Paris Hilton and Charli XCX. Recent notable successes include her participation in Sotheby’s Natively Digital: A Curated NFT Auction and Apotheosis: A Soft Centered Live Motion Capture Experience at the Sydney Opera House.
Roman Jodi
Across his diverse practice—which includes creative direction, fashion design (founder of Jody Just, co-founder Umi Nori), marketing consulting, as well as object-based work—Roman Jody writes his characteristically sharp aesthetic of his inner existence and worship of subcultural movements as a teenager, where he was in Sydney grew up.
Jody’s work is based on Design Thinking, an approach he developed during an academic and professional journey in New York, graduating at the top of his class in Spring 2018 with a BBA in Strategic Design & Management from Parsons School of Design.
Sonny Day
Sonny Day is an Australian artist based in Orange in central west NSW.
A practicing artist for 25 years, he co-owns half of WBYK, a design and illustration studio, with his wife Biddy.
His work focuses on the classics, sex, death and current affairs. He has a deep love for music and sports, both of which flow into his work.
Sonny is represented in Australia by China Heights
content space
In addition to the artwork, the NBA Gallery will also have a dedicated content room showcasing the NBA’s newest web series – “Ingrained” created by Matthew Adekponya.