The Australian Object: Making Material Histories (Material Culture of Art and Design) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1350507830 ISBN 13: 9781350507838

Publisher: Bloomsbury Visual Arts, 2026

Synopsis

This boundary-breaking volume examines an array of objects that, in various ways, complicate narrow definitions of art and Australian identity. It shows how each object has informed and enriched contemporary Australian personal and political life in complex, often overlooked ways.

Featuring essays and object case studies by leading and emerging art historians, artists, curators, historians and anthropologists, The Australian Object offers a material intervention into Australian art and cultural histories by highlighting objects that expand definitions of art, nationhood and identity. It employs an object-led approach that combines art history's attentiveness to form and meaning with material culture's concern for use, materials and patterns of movement, incorporating methodologies from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Knowledge systems, art-making, museology, post- and de-colonialism, ecology, design and theology. Focusing on the useful, mobile and multi-sensory aspects of objects, contributors follow their trajectories across cultures, times and places, and through international networks of trade and migration, connecting Australia with China, Vietnam, Iran, England, France and the USA.

The book is divided into five thematic sections: Living Objects, Collecting Objects, Migrating Objects, Monumental Objects and Immaterial Objects. Rather than chronological or geographical groupings, these sections articulate the shared material qualities of objects and their place in a network of makers and users. Furniture, ceramics, photo-montage, signage and boardgames are newly examined as material agents shaping social, cultural, political and religious life in Australia and beyond. Accordingly, the very term 'Australian object' is called into question as writers propose divergent frameworks that emphasise connection and interchange, bringing to light the material culture that Australia has shaped, denied and inspired.

About this title

About the Authors

Molly Duggins is Lecturer in Art History and Theory at the National Art School, Sydney, Australia. She specializes in 19th-century colonial visual and material culture with an emphasis on intersecting artistic and environmental discourses. Her research has been supported with fellowships and grants from the Yale Center for British Art, the State Library of New South Wales, the Strong National Museum of Play, and Winterthur Museum and Library.

Michael Yonan is Professor of Art History/Alan Templeton Endowed Chair in European Art, 1600–1830 at the University of California at Davis, USA. His research concentrates on eighteenth-century European art, particularly in Central Europe and Scandinavia; on the decorative arts, and on the theory and practice of material culture studies. With Stacey Sloboda he has co-edited Eighteenth-Century Art Worlds: Local and Global Geographies of Art for Bloomsbury Academic.

Mark De Vitis is Lecturer in Early Modern Art at the University of Sydney, Australia. His research is focused on art and design histories, with a particular interest in object heritages and migrations. His research has been supported through fellowships at the Cité internationale des arts and the Getty and Newberry libraries.

Georgina Cole is Lecturer in Art History and Theory at the National Art School, Sydney, Australia, and a member of the International Advisory Board of British Art Studies.

Edition details

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Visual Arts
• Publication date: 2026
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1350507830
• ISBN 13: 9781350507838
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 296
• Editor: Duggins Molly, Vitis Mark De, Cole Georgina