THE MIRROR 2026

The Mirror is a series of new paintings by Melbourne-based, Australian artist Jarrad Martyn, that explore the ways that visual meaning shifts as images move across time, technology, and cultural memory. The Mirror examines the instability of representation and considers how photographs, archives, and museum displays function not as fixed records but as materials that change in significance depending on the moment and context in which they are viewed. The exhibition re-presents and reinterprets archival photographs connected to Albany’s whaling past, reflecting on how their meanings continue to evolve within contemporary ecological and ethical awareness. Martyn draws on these sources through a process that moves between drawing, painting, and digital collage. Gestural marks, textures, and fragments from earlier works are photographed, digitally altered, and reintroduced into the compositions. As a result, the surfaces appear layered, shifting, and suspended between representation and abstraction, and between past, present, and imagined futures. Motifs from museum interiors, taxidermy displays, and ambiguous or idealised landscapes emphasise how institutional settings and systems shape our understanding of the natural world. These references also call attention to the tension between preservation and loss that often sits within such spaces. The Mirror evokes not only the act of reflection but the possibility of seeing ourselves within the images. It invites viewers to recognise their own position within wider environmental and cultural narratives, encouraging a moment of selfreflection on the impacts and choices that shape our shared future.

Exhibited at Albany Town Hall Gallery.