Salote Tawale: Love from here

Love from here was a solo exhibition by Salote Tawale. This video installation acted as a self-portrait and related to her ongoing exploration into cultural identity in particular, the diaspora experience and the realities of being from a mixed heritage. Each element of the work explored the coalescence of her Fijian heritage with everyday life living in contemporary Australia.

The video was in the style of a YouTube cooking show and depicted Tawale in a campfire setting cooking a traditional Fijian dish which used colonial ingredients such as corned beef. Rather than being filmed in her village in Fiji, the video was shot on Australian bushland.

Adding to this idea of removal or relocation, the video was positioned within cut-out paintings of potted indoor plants from her home. The use of indoor plants referenced the idea of bringing the outdoors inside, as well as the colonial practice of importing native species from colonised countries and growing them in unfamiliar environments where they then began to settle.

Artist Biography
From the perspective of her Indigenous Fijian and Anglo-Australian heritage, Tawale explored the identity of the individual within collective systems. Works drew on personal experiences of race, class, ethnicity and gender formed from growing up in suburban Australia.

Having exhibited nationally and internationally, including the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art and Para-Site Gallery, Hong Kong. Tawale recieved the 2017 Create NSW Visual Arts Fellowship and the Michela and Adrian Fini Artist Fellowship through the Sheila Foundation. Tawale undertook an Indigenous Visual and Digital residency at the Banff Centre, Canada and an Australia Council residency (London). Tawale is an Associate Lecturer at Sydney College of the Arts, The University of Sydney.