At Times Joyous and Confronting, NGV Australia’s New Exhibition Explores Motherhood at Scale

The relationship between mother and child is one of the most enduring and universal, transcending time, culture and geography. Depicted in art for thousands of years – from the walls of sheltered rock caves to ancient Egypt, Renaissance frescos to contemporary works – motherhood has been keenly explored. But the experience isn’t all lullabies and baby’s first steps.

MOTHER, a new exhibition at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia, doesn’t sugarcoat any of it – motherhood is rightfully depicted as both joyful and heartbreaking, public and invisible, and punctuated with deep histories, stories and emotion.

Curated by an inter-departmental team comprising Sophie Gerhard, curator of Australian and First Nations art, and Katharina Prugger, curator of contemporary art, MOTHER pulls together more than 200 wide-ranging works from the NGV Collection to explore every aspect of motherhood. It’s a journey that moves through several rooms, each centred on a theme – creating, giving, leaving – to reflect the deeply transformative experience of becoming a mother and the unforgiving march of time.

When Broadsheet walked through the exhibition with Gerhard and Prugger, the pair pointed out some of their favourite works by Australian, First Nations and international artists, including Patricia Piccinini, Tracey Moffatt, Rembrandt van Rijn, Francisco Goya, Louise Bourgeois, Tracey Emin, Camille Henrot, Iluwanti Ken, Käthe Kollwitz and more.

“We’ve got these wonderful, beautiful images and works, but we’ve also got real conversations that draw out and challenge wider conversations around motherhood and maternity,” says Gerhard. “There’s a lot of raw, and challenging, and confronting stories in this exhibition, but we really need a moment to celebrate the loveliness of motherhood as well.”

The exhibition deftly moves from familiar depictions of pregnancy and early motherhood to the challenges and isolation of bringing up young children, and then onto their eventual flight from the family home.

Through it all, works frequently contrast one another to confront differing depictions of motherhood and to bring together both the universal and the culturally specific. Renaissance depictions of the Virgin Mary are set against First Nations artworks; a tiny statue of Isis breastfeeding Horus shares space with early iterations of a baby bottle; joyful moments engage with transformation, invisible labour, harmful stereotypes and deep frustrations.

Artist Ruth O’Leary brought costumes and backdrops to the Flinders Street photobooth for self-portraits with her bub – the resulting work hangs in the exhibition. British artist David Hockney has two pieces showing: a collage of photos of his mother asleep and an etching of his mother with a parrot in his distinctive style.

Hayley Millar Baker’s Entr’acte is a silent black and white video, while Kate Just’s An armour of hope is made of knitted metal and yarn to serve as metaphoric armour for her and her adopted child. And a mother-daughter duo from India, Teju Jogi and Soni Jogi, each have works on display that use a distinct art style invented by their family.

The exhibition doesn’t shy away from the heartbreaking moments that can emerge from the experience of motherhood either. A Journey is a major installation by Judith Wright that features found objects and puppetry to explore themes of grief and loss. An arresting procession of surreal figures marching to the underworld, it was inspired by the loss of Wright’s daughter; the artist created these figures to accompany her child to the next world.

“There are only so many stories we were able to tell through the lens of the collection,” says Prugger. “But we were really fortunate to be able to make a few targeted acquisitions to be able to have a more rounded picture of the story.”

Conceptual photographer Joanne Leonard’s photo-collage series Journal of a Miscarriage is one such acquisition, tracing 53 days before, during and after the artist’s miscarriage – a taboo subject in 1973, when these deeply personal works were created.

“It’s something that’s a little bit more in the conversation nowadays,” says Prugger, “but still a topic that affects so many women and pregnant people, and is so little acknowledged, that we felt that was a really powerful work to bring into the show and into the collection.”

MOTHER: Stories from the NGV Collection is now open at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia until July 12, 2026. Entry is free.

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