Tasting the Divine

Joshua Searle
Tasting the Devine, The DAX Centre
30 September - 18 December 2026


Official opening event: Thursday 22 October 6-8pm


Tasting the Divine brings together painting, sculpture and installation to explore how nourishment is carried across generations — through land, memory, culture and family.

Drawing on his Australian-Colombian heritage, Joshua Searle reflects on the ways identity is sustained not only by what we inherit materially, but by the unseen labour, sacrifices and acts of care that make a life possible. Developed following his 2024 return to Colombia to reconnect with his maternal lineage, the exhibition moves between images of abundance and gestures of rest, proposing that healing emerges through relationship rather than possession.

Across the exhibition, nourishment is understood in both physical and emotional terms. Vibrant depictions of tropical fruit and birdlife evoke sustenance, reciprocity and coexistence, while sculptural elements consider the weight carried by parents, grandparents and ancestors whose work continues to support future generations. Rest becomes a powerful metaphor: not as inactivity, but as a condition made possible through collective endurance and intergenerational care.

Presented at the Dax Centre, Tasting the Divine resonates with ongoing conversations around art, wellbeing and mental health. For Searle, creative practice is inseparable from processes of survival, reflection and repair. The exhibition invites viewers to consider their own familial inheritances — the burdens carried on their behalf, the comforts they may take for granted, and the possibility that belonging is found through connection: to family, to community, to culture and to oneself.

In this exhibition, the divine is not distant or transcendent. It is encountered in colour, in memory, in shared histories, and in the simple human experience of being held, sustained and allowed to rest.



OPENING HOURS

Wednesday to Friday
11:00am to 3:30pm

Other times by appointment
The DAX Centre
Kenneth Myer Building, 30 Royal Parade, Parkville VIC 3010



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