Night Flowers is, at its core, an exhibition about the relationship between photography and self-presentation: the collaborative, sometimes theatrical process through which photographer and subject arrive together at an image. Presented for New Annual, Night Flowers brings together portraits made over a decade in London’s late-night dancefloors, clubs, cabaret venues and surrounding streets. The resulting photographs document a community for whom costume, gesture and performance become powerful instruments of self-definition. Each portrait captures a moment in which identity is constructed, embodied and made visible. For this exhibition, Damien Frost has been commissioned to create a new, locally-focused body of work documenting members of Newcastle and the wider Hunter region’s drag, club and cabaret communities. Produced in dialogue with the original Night Flowers series, these new portraits extend the project’s exploration of identity, performance and belonging. Together, the two bodies of work consider how place as a protagonist shapes performance and community, and self-representation. In bringing these works into conversation, Night Flowers reflects on photography’s capacity to both document and participate in the continual making of selfhood.

Pseudonym Gallery warmly invites you to 'Re'a solo exhibition by Newcastle based artist Joshua Bollback Butler. Joshua is a storyteller, creating rich tapestries of flora and fauna, woven together to give viewers a window into his soul. Come and join us for drinks on Saturday the 3rd of October at 3pm and see works Butler created, inspired by his country, Australian natives and animals in a decorative and Art Nouveau inspired style with a contemporary twist. This exhibition runs until Saturday 17th of October.

Kimberly Swan’s observations of everyday objects, interiors and familiar scenes take on new meaning in Completely Normal and Other Lies. Created over twelve months, the works began without a set theme, gradually becoming a personal record of her experience of perimenopause. Through oil paintings, installation and assemblage, Swan explores the physical, emotional and cognitive changes of a life stage that is often misunderstood and under-discussed. The exhibition examines the contradictions of appearing “completely normal” while navigating brain fog, exhaustion, anxiety and unpredictable shifts in daily life. Humour runs through the work, offering perspective on its frustrations and absurdities. Both personal and inviting, the exhibition opens a conversation around experiences that can feel isolating, making them visible and shared.

In his debut solo exhibition, Lux Ex Machina, local artist and tinkerer Phil McGrath gives new life to the lost, obsolete and discarded machines of the 20th century. Working with everything from vintage blowtorches, hand pumps and bicycle parts to hydraulics, gramophones and domestic objects, McGrath transforms salvaged components into a collection of finely balanced, functional lamps. The works bring together the raw practicality of industrial machinery with the character and familiarity of objects once found in workshops, garages and homes. Functional parts are reworked into sculptural forms, revealing the unexpected beauty, ingenuity and personality hidden within obsolete technology. Lux Ex Machina is a celebration of reuse, invention and the pleasure of seeing forgotten objects illuminated in a completely new way.

Sydney artist Liz Payne presents her first exhibition in Newcastle with The Surrounds Around, a multidisciplinary body of work spanning painting, textiles and design. Payne works across art, craft and design, using bold colour, pattern, texture and form to explore abstraction. In this exhibition, botanical, topographical and astrological influences move between the microscopic and the macro-cosmic, drawing on shapes and patterns repeated throughout the natural world. Themes of place, connection and the universe run through Payne’s practice, alongside an interest in challenging the usual boundaries between painting, textiles, craft and design.

Soft Edge brings together embroidery, textiles, painting and assemblage in a body of work exploring repetition, mirrored imagery and imagined narratives. Helena Newcombe combines embroidery with acrylic paint, using stitching to add texture and detail to painted surfaces. Animals appear throughout the exhibition as symbolic, almost talisman-like forms, bringing a sense of familiarity and vulnerability to the work. The slow, repetitive process of embroidery is an important part of Newcombe’s practice, allowing the work to build gradually through colour, texture and pattern.

Tender brings together established artists Jackie Gorring and Jill Orr in a collaborative exhibition of printmaking, sculpture and watercolour. Based in Victoria, Gorring works across handmade relief prints, sculpture and ceramics, with a practice characterised by humour, experimentation and a sense of creative play. Orr has exhibited professionally since her first exhibition in Accra, Ghana, in 1975. She taught at Newcastle Art School for 30 years and has exhibited widely, with work held in private and public collections. For Tender, she presents colour-filled floral watercolours alongside Gorring’s more sculptural and graphic works. Together, the exhibition creates a conversation between two long-established practices, bringing together colour, form, storytelling and a shared sense of curiosity.

In MYTH, Hunter Valley artist Bianca Vern-Barnett explores the point where the inner, imagined world meets collective memory, storytelling and shared experience. Her practice begins with stories that capture her attention, considering why certain narratives endure and what they might reveal about personal experience. Approaching the artist as a kind of receiver, Vern-Barnett remains attentive to the images, ideas and stories that surface, using them to examine the connections between imagination, memory and the world around us. A graduate of UNSW College of Fine Arts, Vern-Barnett has been a finalist in a number of art prizes including the MAC yapang Art Prize, Hornsby Art Prize and National Emerging Art Prize, and was the winner of the 2024 Hunter Emerging Art Prize for painting. Represented by Straitjacket, MYTH is her second solo exhibition with the gallery, following her sold-out debut solo show in 2024.