Major international exhibition heading to SAM

By Georgia Tacey

Dec 5, 2023

New display: Ryan McGinley’s *YEARBOOK* exhibition will hit SAM next year. Photo by Megan Fisher

Shepparton Art Museum is hosting a big exhibition for the biennial PHOTO 2024 festival.

Hold tight - we’re checking permissions before loading more content

From March 1 to July 14, 2024, American artist Ryan McGinley’s photographic project YEARBOOK will be showing at SAM, marking the artist’s first solo exhibition in Australia.

A constantly evolving and changing project, YEARBOOK is a large-scale photographic installation comprising over 700 studio portraits of musicians, artists and creatives living and working in New York.

The collection, first presented in 2008, has been shown in several major public institutions in Japan, Denmark, South Korea and Spain.

“It’s a privilege to be a part of PHOTO 2024, and we’re thrilled to be premiering Ryan McGinley’s work to an Australian audience,” SAM chief executive Melinda Martin said.

“Ryan’s work is so vibrant and celebratory, and many people will be able to see themselves reflected in the multitude of bodies represented in his portraits.

“Despite its scale, each portrait in the installation possesses its own distinct identity; each subject’s unabashed ownership of their moment in front of the camera works as a collective rejection of the ‘perfect body’.”

A regional weekend celebration of PHOTO 2024 and YEARBOOK will take place at SAM on March 8, with details of the weekend’s program to be released next year.