Yinka Shonibare MBE's solo exhibition at Anna Schwartz Gallery focuses on the icon of the alien as a means of negotiating and exploring issues surrounding the long, turbulent history of Australian immigration. As a symbol of foreign-ness, a fictionalised being, the concept of the alien provides a humorous, naïve and populist aesthetic from which to raise issues of belonging in a globalised world.
As a country peopled by foreign settlers from 1788, the show highlights the tension between authorised and unauthorised settlement. Debates that remain rooted in Australian foreign policy from the White Australia Policy (1901) to the Pacific Solution (2001) are brought to the fore by the bold and overwhelming pieces that comprise Invasion, Escape: Aliens Do It Right! Working across three media; sculpture, painting and drawing, the audience initially encounters three aliens. The spectacular flying machines, that two of the sculptures ride, rupture the gallery space, suggestive of an invasion. Whether arriving or departing, the pieces speak of the alienation of foreigners.