MARS is delighted to see Atong Atem’s major new commission The Last Women on display in the Time Fairfax Forecourt at the National Portrait Gallery, Canberra.
The Last Women embodies the Atong's vibrant style of staged studio portraiture. In this monumental self portrait, Atong appears as a recurrent figure, bearing fruit and embracing native flowers, a symbol of her grounding in Australia. She wears a toub featuring a South Sudanese flag, a vintage kimono, Indonesian batik and African wax print, or Ankara. Each prop in The Last Women symbolises ancestral stories of migration and the diversity of the diasporic experience.
We also congratulate Atong for her recent participation in the prestigious Rencontres d’Arles, one of the world’s most renowned and longest-running photography festivals, for the exhibition On Country: Photography from Australia (7 July - 5 October).
Held in partnership with PHOTO Australia, the exhibition features over two hundred photographic works by established and emerging artists that bear witness to both the visible and invisible aspects of being ‘on Country’ – a term embodied by First Peoples in Australia to describe the lands, waterways, seas and cosmos to which they are connected.
Atong was also selected as one of six nominees for the acclaimed Prix de la Photo Madame Figaro Prize 2025, a photography award founded by the French magazine Madame Figaro. The prize champions women photographers featured in the Rencontres d’Arles, highlighting their excellence, creativity and originality of vision.
Held in partnership with PHOTO Australia, the exhibition features over two hundred photographic works by established and emerging artists that bear witness to both the visible and invisible aspects of being ‘on Country’ – a term embodied by First Peoples in Australia to describe the lands, waterways, seas and cosmos to which they are connected.
Atong was also selected as one of six nominees for the acclaimed Prix de la Photo Madame Figaro Prize 2025, a photography award founded by the French magazine Madame Figaro. The prize champions women photographers featured in the Rencontres d’Arles, highlighting their excellence, creativity and originality of vision.
August 23, 2025