Marley Dawson

About the work

The TAKEAWAY exhibition takes place at Canberra Contemporary from 12 September-24 October 2026 and features works by Marley Dawson, Keg de Souza, Gianna Christella Hayes, Gillian Kayrooz, Zora Pang, Janhavi Salvi, and James Tylor. Presented as part of Canberra Art Biennial 2026, the show is accompanied by a public program at multiple venues across Canberra themed around gastropoetics, food security, and diaspora eating imaginaries. Included in the show is a pop-up reading area by Magenta House featuring publications and ephemera that serve as ‘side-dishes’ to the themes explored by the participants of this project. Ultimately, TAKEAWAY takes a regenerative approach into why and how we eat, while digesting fraught histories and ecologies of land, water and labour.

Images

About the artist

Marley Dawson uses chemistry, mechanics and construction techniques to create sculptures and installations that highlight aspects of our world and selves that can be uncanny, surreal and extraordinary. Dawson has been exhibiting extensively for over a decade inside Australia and internationally. Recent solo exhibitions include: Public Furniture, Roslyn Oxley9, Sydney, 2018; Construction (Barangaroo), Barangaroo, Sydney, 2016; Gravity (and Wonder); Palethorp, Roslyn Oxley9, Sydney (2016), Construction (T Street NW), 5×5 Project, Washington DC (2014), Marley Dawson (performance), Kreeger Museum, Washington DC (2014); and Statics and Dynamics, HEMPHILL Fine Arts, Washington DC (2014). In 2023 he received the Fauvette Loureiro Memorial Scholarship from Sydney College of the Arts (SCA), and worked closely with the Wiradjuri community in Albury to deliver the major public art commission Bungambrawatha, on the shores of the Murray River.