LAGUNA: A State of Becoming

05 Nov 2026
05:30pm - 06:45pm
FREE
Garden Building, Bowen Street, RMIT Melbourne

Join us for an exclusive preview of Laguna, a new visual and audio work by artist Alicia Wiley, and hear directly from Alicia about the ideas, memories and cultural histories that shape the work.

Celebrate the artistic visons of artist Alicia Wiley, recipient of RMIT's 2025 Cultural Visions Grant.

RMIT's Cultural Visions Grant supports RMIT students to realise creative projects that explore cultural dynamics within Australia.

Named after Alicia's childhood housing complex in Jakarta, 'Laguna' is a living archive of home, memory and becoming. Set within a garden inspired by Balinese landscapes and imagery and remembered through the lens of her Javanese family heritage, the work brings together barongs, palms, koi, turtles and ancestral spirits as guardians of life and death.

Through a fluid interplay of sound and image, Laguna moves between cultures, genres and states of being. It inhabits the space between tradition and Western influence, childhood and self-awareness, inheritance and autonomy – transforming growing pains into ritual and creating a space where identity, resistance and vulnerability can take root.

We invite you to experience 'Laguna' in a special preview, and hear Alicia in conversation about the work's making, meaning and journey of becoming.

Refreshments provided – RSVP essential.

Presented by RMIT University. The Cultural Visions Grant is enabled by the generous support of RMIT alumnus Ling Ang.

Register

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Acknowledgement of Country

RMIT University acknowledges the people of the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language groups of the eastern Kulin Nation on whose unceded lands we conduct the business of the University. RMIT University respectfully acknowledges their Ancestors and Elders, past and present. RMIT also acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and their Ancestors of the lands and waters across Australia where we conduct our business - Artwork 'Sentient' by Hollie Johnson, Gunaikurnai and Monero Ngarigo.

Learn more about our commitment to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples

LAGUNA: A State of Becoming