People Like Us

People Like Us captures universal aspects of the contemporary human condition in film, animation, digital and interactive art. In a diverse collection of recent new media works by Australian and international practitioners, the exhibition also reveals the many experimental technologies being deployed by artists as they comment on issues confronting us in the 21st century.

Real human experience underpins the exhibition, a concept that extends to visitor engagement with many of the works on display: George Poonkhin Khut's BrightHearts app, for example, uses your real-time biofeed data in heart rate controlled images and sound; John McGhee's digital animations invite visitors to take the wheel on a wild ride through human blood vessels; while Volker Kuchelmeister and Laura Fisher's Veloscape tracks participants' emotional responses as they take a virtual bicycle tour of Sydney inside the gallery space.

International works include Italian Yuri Ancarani's Da Vinci, his acclaimed, uncanny portrayal of a robotic surgical procedure that confounded visitors to the Venice Biennale. Other Australian premieres in People Like Us include British composer Michael Nyman's Hillsborough Memorial, commissioned by the 2014 Liverpool Biennale; and award-winning Luxembourg artist Su-Mei Tse's aurally immersive purring cat portraits.

Well-known Australian artists represented in People Like Us include Daniel Crooks, Angelica Mesiti and Joan Ross, who all deploy innovative filmic methodologies to achieve unexpected and immersive visual experiences. In two firsts, Aboriginal-Chinese artist Jason Wing has created a sound work, which tells a moving story about the Stolen Generation, and Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro present their new, first ever video work.

Curated by UNSW Galleries Director Felicity Fenner, People Like Us is commissioned by National Exhibitions Touring Support (NETS) Australia and will tour to 14 venues across Australia in 2016–2019.

A National Exhibitions Touring Support Australia exhibition developed by UNSW Galleries and toured by Museums & Galleries of NSW. The National Touring Initiative is supported by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its principal arts funding body, and by the Visual Arts and Craft Strategy, an initiative of the Australian, State and Territory Governments.

People Like Us Education Kit (PDF 6.3MB)

• Watch Artist interviews
• Watch Curator interview with Dr Felicity Fenner