Tracey Moffatt | Up in the Sky

Tracey Moffatt’s 1997 series Up in the Sky, is a haunting photographic set of 25 monochrome images that evoke the cinematic stills of a non-linear narrative set in a remote country town marked by hardship and social marginalisation. Through recurring figures—a young non-Indigenous woman and an Indigenous infant, the series subtly references the continents fraught history of assimilation policies and the forced separation of First Nations families, without offering definitive interpretations. Moffatt, known for crafting rather than capturing images, blends personal memory with cultural and cinematic references, drawing from both local iconography, desolate roads, fibro housing, mission churches, and international influences such as Pasolini’s Accattone and the dystopian landscape of Mad Max. The result is a powerful, symbolic meditation on identity, loss, and resilience within the broader context of our postcolonial realities.