Regimes of value: the politics of taste, trade and desire

Taking a cue from anthropologist Arjun Appadurai’s notion of ‘regimes of value’, this display of works from the Bendigo Art Gallery Collection explores the ways in which value has been ascribed and signalled in the Western art tradition. Historic works highlight artistic virtuosity, rich ornamentation, and scenes of wealth, from a spectacularly ornamental Meissen vase to the lively exchange depicted in Franz Hochmann’s A Horse Market in a German Village. Selected contemporary works also appear, including recent acquisitions by Shireen Taweel and Ebony Russell.

This Collection display can be found in Abbott Court built in 1905 and designed by Bendigo architect William Beebe in the grand European tradition (notably the Tate Gallery, London) with polished wood floors, ornate plaster arches and cornices, and diffused natural sky-lighting through rooftop lantern towers. Abbott Court bears the name of Richard Hartley Smith (RHS) Abbott, one of Bendigo Art Gallery’s founders and originator of the RHS Abbott Bequest Fund that continues to support acquisitions of art to the Gallery’s collection today.