A lecture by Dr Adriana Māhanga Lear

Join us at Wollongong Art Gallery for an in-depth insight into the work of queer Tongan-Australian artist Adriana Māhanga Lear.

Fafangu: To Awaken is a new body of work by queer Tongan-Australian artist Adriana Māhanga Lear. The work is based off the artist’s PhD research on revitalising and re-imagining Tongan concepts and practices of ongo (sound), relating to mate (death), putu (funeral rites), and fonua (people and place). Using photography, video, sculpture, installation, sound and music, Lear interrogates the colonial archive to examine the legacies of Eurocentrism and heteropatriarchy on Tongan art forms. This lecture will offer further insight into the methods, research and processes that led to this body of work as well as the conceptual and contextual underpinnings of it.

Image: Adriana Māhanga Lear, Tu’uloa—In standing, to endure, 2024, performance with fangufangu (bamboo nose-flute), Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre. Photo: Chantel Bann. Courtesy of the artist.