MIA BOE

Reality, distilled for their pleasure.
A collection of transiences.
Wanting to escape,
but never wanting to leave.

This is for our protection, right?
Protection from who?
From what?
Living in the day
as if it were night—
like a clock running from 10 to 9.

I want to be alone.

I don’t know how.

I’m waiting for them.

–Mia Boe

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In her latest body of work, Nocturnal House, Mia Boe presents an exhibition shaped by her time in Mparntwe (Alice Springs). Moving between realism and speculative fantasy, these new paintings reflect the emotional intensity of her time spent in a place marked by deep social, political and environmental fracture. The experience was one of solitude and cultural dissonance set against the confronting realities of a town defined by segregation and environmental degradation. ⁠⁠

Boe’s signature elongated silhouettes inhabit the canvasses alongside dingos, fire ants and rhinestones beneath star-lit skies. Some works reflect moments of introspection, loneliness and longing for connection, while others forecast futures where even the sky is not beyond the enduring reach of colonisation. Employing the distinctive visual language for which she has quickly become known, Boe conjures a dreamlike space in which to reckon with the past, present and future. These are paintings of defiance and tenderness, made in the city after time in the desert.⁠⁠