Skip to content

ARTISTS | Dena Kahan

EXHIBITIONS ARTIST’S CV VIEW AVAILABLE PAINTINGS >

Dena Kahan’s painting practice aims to subvert our natural inclination for order and perfection.

Dena Kahan’s work concerns itself with our relationship with nature, and our attempts to control and classify it. In her work, the natural history collection acts as a metaphor for this attempt to organise the natural world and our impact on it. Glass display cases create reflections and ambiguities of space and scale, undermining the order and organisation of the museum environment, creating a fantastic world. Her paintings segue neatly into the art museum environment, evidenced by the survey exhibition of her work at Ballarat Fine Art Gallery in 2014.

Kahan’s recent work extends her exploration of the natural history museum, taking as her subject the collection of antique botanical models at the The Santos Museum of Economic Botany, Adelaide; the Botanic Gardens Edinburgh and the Whipple Museum of the History of Science, Cambridge.  In these current works, insects infiltrate the sterile environment of the museum store or display case, drawn to these artificial replicas of the plant world. This imagery references the tradition of 17th century Dutch still life, in which plants and insects take on symbolic meanings and flowers of different seasons bloom together.

Photography: Chris Budgeon.

Exhibitions:

GOLD CHIP | one-night-only exhibition

Gallerysmith closes the 2023 curtain on December 12 with the annual exhibition, GOLD CHIP. At this one-night-only event, the gallery presents…

Read more

XV: PAST PRESENT FUTURE

Gallerysmith launches its 2023 exhibition program with a group exhibition which celebrates 15 years of gallery operations. This exhibition features works by more than 50 artists who have shown at the gallery between 2008 and 2023....
Read more

Wunderkammer | Dena Kahan

Dena Kahan’s Wunderkammer exhibition revisits archival sources that have informed her work since 2008 – nineteenth century botanical and zoological models made from glass or papier-mâché. When Kahan was unable to travel during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic, she journeyed back through her own records of prior research trips ...... excerpt from catalogue essay by Saskia Beudel
Read more

BAYSIDE ACQUISTIVE ART PRIZE at Bayside Gallery

Dena Kahan's Painting Still Life with Dianthus and Bee is a finalist at the 2020/1 Bayside Acquisitive Art Prize
Read more

I AM WOMAN | International Women’s Day 2021

On International Women's Day 2021 we acknowledge the achievements of girls and women around the world. We celebrate those who ...
Read more

Hothouse | Dena Kahan

Dena Kahan’s new body of work, Hothouse, continues her investigation into museum collections, taking as her subject the antique botanical models in the collection of the University of Melbourne Herbarium and the Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences in Sydney...
Read more

Lure | Dena Kahan

Using museum collections as subject matter for still life painting, Dena Kahan plays with ambiguities of scale, space and reflection to undermine the clear containment of the museum case...
Read more

An Unnatural History | Dena Kahan

An Un-natural History concerns itself with the human desire for order and perfection through an investigation of our attempts to control nature. These seductive images take as their subject the Blaschka Glass Flower display at the Harvard Natural History Museum in the USA...
Read more
Painting by Dena Kahan

The Provisional Sublime | Dena Kahan

Dena Kahan’s current work derives from her close study of the famous assemblage of botanical specimens made from glass in the Harvard Museum of Natural History – known for over a century as the Glass Flowers Collection of Harvard University....
Read more
Dena Kahan, Glass Garden #4, 51x107cm

Strange Garden | Dena Kahan

Dena Kahan’s delicate Strange Garden explores the insatiable human desire for order by classification, documentation and presentation. These works replicate museum display cases of glass specimens, but Kahan’s simple shifts in perspective, depth of field and pictorial composition subvert taxonomy to create a strange and chaotic wonderland.
Read more

CV:

Dena Kahan
born 1960, lives in Melbourne

Education

2015     Masters of Arts by research, Federation University, Victoria
1992     Bachelor of Fine Arts, Victorian College of the Arts
1982     Bachelor of Arts, Honours Degree in Art History, University of Melbourne

Solo Exhibitions

2020
Hothouse 2, Gallerysmith, Melbourne
Hothouse, M Contemporary, Sydney

2018
Lure, Gallerysmith, Melbourne

2017
Herbarium, Gallerysmith, Melbourne

2015
Dena Kahan: The Glass Garden, Art Gallery Ballarat, Ballarat

2014
An Un-Natural History, Gallerysmith, Melbourne

2012
The Provisional Sublime
, Gallerysmith, Melbourne

2011
Glass Garden, Gallerysmith, Melbourne

2009
Strange Garden, Red Gallery, Melbourne

2008
Recent Paintings, Fortyfivedownstairs, Melbourne
On Glass, Woodbine Art, Malmsbury

2007
The Idea of Perfection, Alluvial Gallery, Bendigo

2006
Looking Through Glass, Fortyfivedownstairs, Melbourne

2002
New Paintings, Dickerson Gallery, Melbourne

1997
Some things to do with string, WestSpace, Melbourne

1993
Looking Up, Linden Gallery, Melbourne

Selected Curated and Prize Exhibitions

2022
The Len Fox Painting Prize (finalist), Castelmaine Art Gallery
Bayside Acquisitive Art Prize (finalist), Bayside Gallery, Brighton
OMNIA Art Prize, St Kevin’s College, Melbourne

2021
Arthur Guy  Memorial Painting Prize (finalist), Bendigo Art Gallery
Bayside Art Prize
(finalist), Bayside Gallery, Brighton

2019
The Sublime Sea: Rapture and Reality (curated exhibition), Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery
Arthur Guy Painting Prize, (finalist), Bendigo Art Gallery
Georges River Art Prize, (finalist), Hurstville Museum and Gallery, Sydney

2018
Recent Acquisitions, Town Hall Gallery, Victoria
Wyndham Art Prize, (finalist)

2017
Hyperbotanica, Gallerysmith, Victoria

2016
Rick Amor Drawing Prize, (shortlisted), Ballarat Art Gallery, Victoria

2015
Unintended (Refrains:), George Paton Gallery, University of Melbourne

2014
Stanthorpe Festival Art Show, WINNER, Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery, QLD
Geelong Art Prize, (shortlisted), Geelong Art Gallery
Gold Coast Art Prize, (shortlisted) Gold Coast Art Gallery, Queensland

2012
Tidal: City of Devonport Art Award, (shortlisted), Devonport, Tasmania
McGivern Prize, (shortlisted), Maroondah Art Gallery

2010
Fletcher Jones art prize, (shortlisted), Geelong Gallery
Strange Nature, Red Gallery, Melbourne

2009
R&M McGivern Prize, (shortlisted)
In Modern Memory, Latrobe University Visual Arts Centre, Bendigo

2007
Darebin Art Prize, (shortlisted)
An intimate look, UPstairs Gallery, Bundanon Homestead, NSW

2006
Fletcher Jones Art Prize, (shortlisted), Geelong Art Gallery
Robert Jacks Drawing Prize, (shortlisted), Bendigo Art Gallery
In Modern Memory, Blindside Gallery, Melbourne

2004
Phyllis Palmer Gallery, La Trobe University, Bendigo

2003
Reunion, George Paton Gallery, University of Melbourne

2001-03
We Are Australian, Travelling Exhibition, Australia and abroad, Victorian Arts Centre

1999
Minim-art, Talk Artist’s Initiative, Melbourne

1998
Carolyn Dew, Dena Kahan & Susan Hewitt, Talk Artist’s Initiative, Melbourne

1997
Latrobe Street Gallery, Melbourne

1996
Love at the Carlisle Lodge Motel, Carlisle Lodge Motel, Melbourne
Everyone Goes to Dimmeys, Dimmeys shop window, Melbourne

1995
Artworkz 7, Gallery 101, Melbourne
Shifting Ground, Linden Gallery, Melbourne
Murdoch Prize Exhibition, Melbourne

1994
6 Easy Pieces, Elizabeth Boustead & Dena Kahan, Temple Studios, Melbourne

1993
Parcel Post Show, RM 4, Linden Gallery, Melbourne

1992
Platform, Melbourne

 Awards / Residencies

2015     Foundation Obras art residency, Evoramonte, Portugal
2014     Winner – Stanthorpe Art Prize, Qld
2008     Awarded a New Work Grant by the Australia Council for the Arts
2008     Studio Residency, Barbican Arts Trust, London
2005     Bundanon Artist’s Residency
1995     Awarded Pat Corrigan exhibition grant
1989     Sponsored by the Ian Potter Foundation to study in Florence
1984     Awarded the Harold Wright and Sarah and William Holmes

Scholarships to study in the Department of Prints and Drawings, British Museum

Media/ Essays

Wondrous but strange: botanical collections and the contemporary artist, Alison Inglis, November 2012
After the Weather, Win News, Channel 9, 23, May 2007
Terri-Anne Kingsley, ABC Website, 14 May 2007
Jo Printz, Breakfast with Jonathan Ridnell, ABC Local Radio, Central Victoria, 14 May 2007
James Taylor, The Bendigo Advertiser, 17 May 2007
Amanda Smith, The Deep End, Radio National, 6 September, 2006
Penny Webb, The Age, 15 September, 2006
Megan Backhouse, The Age, 16 September, 2006
Stephen Haley, A reflection, on glass, Catalogue Essay, 2006
Megan Backhouse, The Age, 25 February, 2006
Amanda Johnson, New Paintings, Sky Pieces, Catalogue Essay, 2002
Megan Backhouse, The Age, July 2002
Sandra Bridie, Conversations between Carolyn Dew, Susan Hewitt, Dena Kahan
Rebecca Lancashire, The Age, 19 December, 1997
Anna Clabburn, The Age, 17 December, 1997

Collections

Bundanon Trust
Ian Potter Museum, Melbourne
Museum of Victoria
Town Hall Gallery, City of Boroondara, Melbourne
Lyceum Club, Melbourne
Private collections in Australia and abroad

News:

DENA KAHAN FINALIST IN BAYSIDE PRIZE

We're excited to share that Dena Kahan's painting Still Life with Dianthus and Bee, 2019, is a finalist in the…

Read more

DENA KAHAN ARTIST PROFILE + Q&A

Dena Kahan’s painting practice aims to subvert our natural inclination for order and perfection. Using museum collections as subject matter…

Read more

DENA KAHAN SELECTED FOR 2020 WINTER COLOUR FORECAST

Dena Kahan was selected by interior designer Bree Leech to feature in the Dulux 2020 winter colour forecast campaign. This…

Read more

Inspiration:

Back To Top