Three Highlights from ROMULUS’s Visit to Sydney Contemporary
5 October 2026
Written by Xin Ji
Sydney Comporary 2026.
Last month, ROMULUS Folio visited Sydney Contemporary 2026, held at Carriageworks from 3–6 September. There was plenty to take in, but a few works made me stop and spend a little longer looking. These were three highlights from our visit.
One of the first works that caught my eye was William Kentridge’s Family Portrait (2026), displayed near the entrance. Although it was monochrome, I found it more visually striking than many of the colourful works around it. Its strong contrasts and dense, textured marks gave the objects a sense of weight, almost as though they were sculptural forms.
Created using coffee-lift aquatint etching on nine sheets of Phumani handmade paper mounted on raw cotton, the artwork has an uneven, layered surface that gives it a rough, expressive quality. It invites multiple interpretations. At first, I saw a collection of household objects, but then the lampshade and lightbulb began to resemble an eyelid and eyeball, making the arrangement feel slightly mysterious. The title, Family Portrait, made this impression even more intriguing, as though the objects had personalities and relationships of their own.
William Kentridge, Family Portrait, 2026, coffee-lift aquatint etching on Phumani handmade paper mounted on raw cotton, 128 × 179 cm.
Another memorable encounter was The Poetry of Things by Annette Blair and Kirstie Rea, presented by Sabbia Gallery. Their collaborative still lifes bring together glass and found materials, recreating fruit, cloth and familiar household objects with extraordinary sensitivity.
Annette Blair + Kirstie Rea, Workshop composition – a day the studio, 2026, glass, brush bristles, wall shelf.
What impressed me most was how convincingly glass could suggest softness. The folds of cloth and the rounded forms of fruit made me pause and question what I was looking at. Walking around the works was also part of the experience. From different angles, the objects overlapped differently, and details that had seemed minor suddenly became more noticeable.
Annette Blair + Kirstie Rea, To Gather – Nourish, 2026, glass, wall shelf.
It made me think about how rarely I spend time looking closely at everyday objects. We usually pick them up, use them and move on. Here, these objects no longer have a practical function, and I noticed people spending more time appreciating their shapes, surfaces and small irregularities.
Annette Blair + Kirstie Rea, Workshop composition – from the studio, 2026, glass, brush bristles, wall shelf.
At Flinders Lane Gallery, I was particularly interested in Stuart McLachlan’s paper sculptures and his photographic collaboration with Simon Cardwell. Their Extinction Denied series brings intricately constructed paper animals and architectural settings into imagined scenes.
Flinders Lane Gallery booth at Sydney Contemporary 2026.
Seeing both the physical constructions and the photographs made the process especially engaging. Up close, I could appreciate the delicate materials and the work involved in assembling them. In the photographs, those same constructions took on a different scale and atmosphere, becoming worlds that seemed possible to enter.
With my architectural background, I was reminded of making physical models as a student. I enjoyed seeing these models presented as artworks. It was also interesting that the sculptures and photographs were sold separately, allowing viewers to experience the same scene in different ways.
CARDWELL + MCLACHLAN, Siberian Cranes, 2026, limited edition, eco-solvent print on cotton rag paper, 86 × 150 cm (framed: 88 × 152.5 cm); STUART MCLACHLAN, Passage to Tomorrow, 2026, Arches watercolour rag paper, card, sandstone, glue, acrylic paint, wire and wood, with acrylic display case, 46 × 112 × 39 cm.
These works were among the highlights of ROMULUS Folio’s visit to Sydney Contemporary 2026. Their different approaches to materials and presentation offered opportunities for close looking and reflected the range of artistic practices represented at the fair.
Sydney Contemporary is an annual art fair held at Carriageworks, 245 Wilson Street, Eveleigh, Sydney. The fair brings together Australian and international galleries, presenting contemporary art across a wide range of media.