Experience Sam Harrison’s new work Letters Home (Continued 1) is now showing in the Artbank Prize 2026 Finalists exhibition at Artbank Sydney.
How do the words we chose to make, reflect who we are? In Letters Home (Continued 1), Harrison continues his series of charcoal works, glazed in glass epoxy, which employ abstracted patterns in reference to Wiradjuri and Kamilaori scar tress. These patterns function as a written language, marking out boundaries in the landscape. Questioning if colonial languages can hold a capacity to express experiences which are so far removed from colonial belief systems, this work reflects how language embodies the worldviews from the cultures of which they arise from.
Sam describes the abstracted text, which overlays the charcoal drawing, as holding within it, “desires to write home, to send updates of life to grandparents, to ask for updates on trivially important politics and if the siblings are stepping up in their new jobs. It is an imagined nostalgia for a mundane life steeped in the lived experience of our cultural values.”
Experience Letters Home (Continued 1), now showing until the 30th of October. Congratulations to Sam and all eight finalists on this significant achievement!
For more information about the Artbank Prize and exhibition, see the Artbank website.
Image 1: Sam Harrison, Letters Home (Continued 1), 2026. Charcoal drawing on canvas with glass epoxy. 101cm x 76cm x 4cm (framed). Photo: Courtesy of the artist and Onespace