Ghosts in the Kitchen: Food, Memory and the Indigenous Gothic

Ghosts in the Kitchen is a powerful new group exhibition guest curated by Rebecca Ray, featuring artworks by Australian First Nations artists. Inviting audiences to experience food as a living connection between culture, memory and Country.

Rebecca Ray is an experienced Meriam curator and writer, living and working on Gadigal land, her practice is concerned with the re-Indigenisation of sovereign spaces.

Ray has framed the exhibition through the lens of the Indigenous Gothic, a literary and artistic approach which reclaims traditional colonial gothic customs through First Nations perspectives. The exhibition transforms the narrative of haunting into acts of strength and survival, exploring how food is more than sustenance; it carries ancestral knowledge and embodies resilience in the face of colonisation.

Featuring works by Kerry Klimm, Bernard Singleton Jnr, Simone Arnol, Elisa Jane Carmichael, Nicholas Currie, Penny Evans, James Ahmat Snr, Dylan Bolger, Jacqueline Jacky, Steven Russell, Kristine Stewart, and the Bankstown Koori Elders Group, the collection of artworks reflect on the trauma of colonial food systems while celebrating the ongoing resurgence of First Nations food sovereignty.

‘Here, the gothic is not confined to grief or loss; it is a living force where ancestral practices re-emerge in kitchens, gardens and community. The ghosts you meet here are not lost, they are a reawakening of cultural practice, memory and ancestors.’

– Rebecca Ray

Read more about the exhibition with words by Rebecca Ray and about select artworks here