Street art exhibition draws crowd on opening night as funding for gallery announced

What would the voice inside your head sound or look like?

For profoundly deaf street artist Jaycob Campbell, aka Gonketa, his inner monologue manifests itself as sign language and hand gestures.

His new exhibition at the Benalla Art Gallery, Moving Forward, portrays the artist’s innermost thoughts through vibrant paintings and projections.

Through a translator, Gonketa spoke to a group of about 50 viewers at the exhibition opening on Friday evening about the personal nature of the exhibition.

“You can see from the artwork on show here this evening that the exhibition is an insight into my brain,” Gonketa said.

“It’s showing you my first language, exactly what I see and think.

“It is all about visuals. It’s not at all about linear language. English. Everything that I see, everything that I think, is visual.

“I would say it’s (the exhibition) probably 80 per cent Auslan sign language, maybe more.

“And it’s also other languages around the world.

“There’s also some gestures that you can see, national gestures that might come easily or are iconic to people.”

Walking through the exhibition, you glimpse what it is like to think exclusively through visuals.

The viewer can reflect on their thoughts and question how their means of thinking would change if sound and voice were off the table.

It’s an important question to consider in terms of understanding and supporting deaf people.

Toby Benador, director of Just Another Agency, said this was one of his considerations when picking an artist for an exhibition in Benalla.

“I wanted to showcase an artist with purpose and passion,” Mr Benador said.

“I wanted to support an artist whose creativity and messaging deserved a means to be amplified.

“I had worked with Gonketa previously on an installation called Hands Up that explored hand gestures, shape and form and aimed to raise awareness about the use of illiteracy in sign language.

“It felt more than fitting to give him the opportunity to showcase his work.

“Moving forward is about breaking barriers and breaking conceptions, prompting viewers to think deeply about exactly how they think.”

The exhibition opening also provided an opportunity to think about the funding of the arts.

Eric Nash, Benalla Art Gallery director, spoke at the exhibition opening about a new campaign from the Public Galleries Association of Victoria.

The Our Creative Heart campaign aims to draw attention to public galleries that are in crisis due to a lack of funding.

The association states that without significant change, art collections will deteriorate, art gallery professionals will be burnt out, and Victoria will miss out on a vibrant local visual arts culture.

Following his speech, Federal Member for Indi Helen Haines announced some exciting news regarding funding for the Benalla Gallery.

“Eric just gave us a bit of a lament about the state of the funding for our arts and our gallery in particular,” Dr Haines said.

“A few months ago, I brought the Assistant Minister for the Arts, Susan Templeman, down to Wangaratta, and we had a big arts roundtable, and we all talked about how much we love the arts.

“At that roundtable, (what) was so clear to Susan Templeman when she spoke to me some weeks later in parliament was what passion (for the arts) there is in this region.

“Something that she doesn’t see everywhere in rural or regional Australia.

“So that passion has just been rewarded, and I’m just absolutely thrilled to announce that Benalla Art Gallery has been awarded the Creative Australia visual art and craft strategy grant of $400,000.

“To have this money coming into us now into this gallery is an extraordinary achievement.

“And what makes it more extraordinary is that there were only 13 of these announced across the nation; this was highly competitive.

“So, a massive congratulations to the Benalla Art Gallery for the work that it takes to put together a grant application.

“I think there are other drafts in the pipeline for this beautiful gallery, and I am very hopeful that in the next year, we might see something else because we know that we want capital work done here.

“We know we want this beautiful gallery to truly shine, to truly grow, and to be absolutely shining again.”