Natalie King – Sunday Arts Magazine

As the Olympics inject excitement into our lockdown days, there’s a cultural project of contemporary photography by 8 leading artists from Australia and Japan to feature in a major exhibition as part of the Tokyo Tokyo Festival for the 2021 Tokyo Olympics Cultural Olympiad which will be staged at the premier photography museum in Japan.

Conceived pre-covid, it’s a miracle Reversible Destiny: Australian and Japanese contemporary photography exhibition is happening and in the context of Olympic ideals and values, it poses reflection and offers hope for us all.

The artists are looking at what it means to make photography now, in a time of global upheaval, human fragility and uncertain future – what are our shared destinies across nations?

Melbourne based exhibition co-curator Natalie King, a leading Australian curator with an Asia-Pacific region specialisation and significant Venice Art Biennale curating experience, poses the big questions – where are we now, what is our collective future, how is this informed by the past?