As part of a series of short summer exhibitions, DRAW Space is thrilled to present Murray+Burgess / POTENCY.
Opening Thursday 22 January, 6-8pm. Please join the artists and the DRAW Space community to celebrate this exceptional exhibition.
Ro Murray and Mandy Burgess are two art-collaborators working from Durag and Gundungurra country in Mt Victoria, who became artists late after careers and families. Both were impacted by powerful exhibitions of the work of Louise Bourgeois, Phyllida Barlow and Emily Kam Kngwarray.
In POTENCY Murray and Burgess present an installation of drawings of older Australian female artists who challenge society’s assumptions about productivity in later life: they are powerful role models for all female artists. Accompanying the portraits are drawings of the Regent Honeyeater and yellow glyphs of its translated birdsong, connecting this work with an ongoing project on the endangered bird. Murray and Burgess celebrate the potency of these older female artists: both the birds and the women are in full flight.
Murray and Burgess, SCOOP, 2025, charcoal, ink on paper, acrylic on plywood, 150 x 1100 cm
About Mandy Burgess
Mandy Burgess’s art practice explores relationships between people and with the natural environment. She uses commonly found materials and handmade paper, emphasising the qualities of materials and processes to highlight resonances and connections. Since graduating in honours from the National Art School in 2012 she has taken part in many group shows. Part of her practice is the active collaboration Murray and Burgess formed in 2015 with Ro Murray. The collaboration, which makes large scale installations on environmental issues, had a solo exhibition enabled by a Create NSW grant at the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre in 2022/23, has been included in several Canberra Art Biennials, as well as presenting solo shows and being selected for many sculpture exhibitions.
www.murrayandburgess.com.au @mandybur @murrayburgessart
About Ro Murray
Ro Murray is a multi-disciplinary artist moving between Mt Victoria, Sydney and Killcare. Her art practice is influenced by her former career in architecture and attending the National Art School as a mature age student, majoring in sculpture. Since 2018 her practice has focussed on relief printmaking. More recently her work on pianola rolls concerns narrative and place, with topographic and historic references.
Ro has staged many solo exhibitions and been selected for many art prizes and awards. In the last year she has exhibited pianola rolls in the Arte Laguna Prize Venice, Canberra Art Biennial, Paper Room Sydney Contemporary, and was acquired by the NSW State Library; selected finalist for the Artist Book Awards at Manly Library and Crescendo Clifton School of Arts, KAAF Art Prize, and received an Award of Excellence at WAMA Art Prize Grampians.
Ro is part of the creative partnership Murray and Burgess. Besides making sculptural installations, they have incorporated charcoal-wall-drawings in their practice.
www.murrayandburgess.com.au www.romurray.com.au @romurray @murrayburgessart