This December, we welcome Daniel Adgag back for his fourth solo exhibition at Messums with the inaugural presentation of a new body of work. Agdag presents a series of cautionary structures – precarious forms that appear dormant, perched on stilts above a rising tide. They evoke a sense of quiet tension, balancing between stability and fragility, presence and absence. As with much of Agdag’s practice, the medium used is as much philosophical as is practical. A sustainable, recycled cardboard which echoes the vulnerability of the systems and environments it references. This body of work specifically responds to the exhibition space itself – the thirteenth-century tithe barn, a 400-year-old structure built from straw and found rock – resilient, grounded, and deeply connected to the environment it inhabits.
Agdag is an artist and filmmaker based in Melbourne, Australia, whose practise sits at the nexus of sculpture and motionography. He creates highly detailed sculptural pieces described as ‘architectural in form, whimsical and antiquated in nature and inconceivably intricate’. His principal materials are boxboard, glue and a scalpel. Drawn to the utilitarian origins and monochromatic presentation of his primary material cardboard, he creates a paradox of fragility and strength with structures that resemble architectural forms and machines by using a material that is essentially paper.
Together with solo shows in Melbourne, New York and London, Agdag has been presented at international art fairs across the world including Melbourne Art Fair, Sydney Contemporary, SWAB Barcelona, Estampa Art Fair Madrid, Art Central Hong Kong, VOLTA Basel and Art Fair Tokyo. He is an award-winning film maker, and his work is held in private collections in the United States, Japan, Hong Kong, Australia and Europe.
Agdag has completed a number of private commissions, notable for Hermès Paris in 2014 and 2019 as well as a collaboration as Scenographer in 2021. A large-scale public commission – a steel installation for Hampton, ‘The Inspector’ in Abbotsford, Melbourne. His most recent commission ‘Lattice’ in 2022 was for New York City Department of Education, New York. In addition to fine art, Agdag is an accomplished film maker. He is a three-time Dendy Award winner and a two-time AACTA/AFI nominee and winner as well as being shortlisted for an Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film 2018 and a finalist for the Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize in 2025.
