Artists have been transforming found materials through cutting, assembling and pasting for centuries. Processes such as collage and assemblage flourished in Australia from the mid-twentieth century, with artists repurposing the discarded detritus of modern life to create new meaning. Through collage and photomontage, artists reconfigure images to examine themes such as feminism, environmentalism, and the connection between self and place.

Metamorphosis brings together work by more than thirty Australian artists from the HOTA Collection, who have used these transformative methods to explore ideas of identity, memory and perception. The exhibition title draws from the words of Colin Lanceley, a key figure in the development of assemblage art in Australia, who observed: ‘The transformation of materials, the metamorphosis, informed by a poetic sensibility, is the key to creativity.’

Included in the exhibition are works by Lorraine Connelly-Northey, Rosalie Gascoigne, James Gleeson, Robert Klippel, Julie Rrap, Sally Smart, Ruby Spowart, Brett Whiteley, Judith Wright and Jemima Wyman.

_{Image: Ruby Spowart, South Stradbroke triptych 1992, silver gelatin prints, collaged. Collection, HOTA Gallery. Gifted by the citizens of the Gold Coast to future generations 1993 © The artist’s estate}