Henry Roy - Impossible Island

In a world-first, legendary photographer Henry Roy will hold his first survey at The Art Gallery of Western Australia.

Henry Roy – Impossible Island draws on 40-years of recollections and observations as it brings together 113 photos taken from 1983 to 2023.

The images were shot in places such as his native Haiti, Ibiza, Paris, Dakar, Cameroon, Normandy, Marrakesh, Thailand, and the Ivory Coast.

Image: Henry Roy Girl sleeping, Brazzaville 2002.
Image: Henry Roy Girl sleeping, Brazzaville 2002.

Impossible Island channels the many influences that have shaped Roy’s artistic journey including his exile from his homeland of Haiti to his love of literature and passion for New Wave French cinema.

Henry Roy’s work has been of international interest since the 1990s because of the incredible beauty and richness of his imagery, qualities that have made him a sought-after photographer in magazine editorial and exhibition contexts.

His photographic vision was a key component of the new publishing trends in the late 1990s, specifically as a contributor to Purple, and later in the 2000s Hobo magazine. "Impossible Island evokes my exile from Haiti, and the quest for a metaphorical island, an imaginary refuge where one can escape the brutality of the world. It presents a bittersweet universe where water and sunlight dominate, symbols of both life and death." Henry Roy, Art photographer and writer.

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February

Melbourne: 28 Nov 2025 – 26 May 2026. The exhibition celebrates the wide-ranging photographic practices of more than eighty women artists working between 1900 and 1975.

Sydney: Until 11 April. Unfinished Business brings together the voices of 30 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people living with disabilities from remote, regional, and urban communities across Australia.

Canberra: Until 6 Sept 2026. Trent Parke’s photographic series The Christmas tree bucket 2006–09 is a tender and darkly humorous portrayal of his extended family coming together to celebrate Christmas.

Melbourne: 11 Feb – 25 April 2026. Familial brings together six international artists whose work navigates the emotional and psychological terrain of family.

March

Sydney: Until 7 Feb 2027. From his archive of more than 200,000 images, Close Up celebrates the historic moments and pivotal people he famously captured.

Melbourne: 5 March – 7 August 2026. Between the mid-1970s and early 1990s, artist and social documentary photographer Viva Gibb (1945-2017) documented the suburbs of North and West Melbourne, where she lived.

Melbourne: 7 March – 24 May 2026. Photos of flowers from the NGA collection by prominent photographers drawn such as Robert Mapplethorpe and four groundbreaking Australian photographers.

Melbourne: 10 March – 5 May 2026. TOPshots is an annual celebration of emerging photo-media artists selected from a large pool of entries.

April

Sydney: 9 April event 6-9pm. Unfinished is a free event to show/see photo-based work in progress or recently completed personal projects run by photographers for photographers.