Juno Gemes

Juno Gemes (born 1944) is a Hungarian-born Australian activist and photographer, best known for her photography of Aboriginal Australians. A performer, theatre director, writer and publisher, Gemes was one of the founders of Australia's first experimental theatre group The Human Body.

Early life Juno Gemes was born in 1944 in Budapest, Hungary, emigrating to Australia with her parents Alex and Lucy Gemes in 1949. In 1968 Gemes directed The Human Body Australia's first experimental theatre group, established with Johnny Allen and Clem Gorman. Some of The Human Body Performances at the Powerhouse warehouse in Haymarket featured a geodesic light dome built by Jacky Joy Jacobson and Michael Glasheen from 5,000 light bulbs. Gemes worked in theatre and film, and in the late 1960s and 1970s worked sporadically in London, where she wrote for the London-based underground newspaper International Times. While in London, Gemes performed in some of Yoko Ono's work including the avant-garde film Bottoms and a performance piece The scream at the Perfumed Garden.

Photography Gemes began exhibiting her photography in Australia in 1966, and held her first solo exhibition, We Wait No More, in 1982. Collaborating with another member of the Collective, landscape artist Mick Glasheen, to document traditional stories about Uluru. including land rights, the handing back of Uluru to the traditional owners, and the National Apology to the Stolen Generations in the Federal Parliament. Gemes describes Nothing Personal by James Baldwin and Richard Avedon, which examines American culture including civil rights and the rise of black nationalism, as an early influence in her work. from the Aboriginal Tent Embassy to 2008 when she was one of ten photographers selected to officially document the Apology to Australia's Indigenous peoples.

Gemes has thirty works in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery in Australia. Her papers are held at the National Library of Australia and the Mitchell Library of the State Library of New South Wales.

Publishing

In 1986, Gemes and her partner Australian poet Robert Adamson until 2002.

In 1997, Adamson and Gemes collaborated on the publication The Language of Oysters.

In January 2025, Gemes published Until Justice Comes: Fifty Years of The Movement for Indigenous Rights. PHOTOGRAPHS 1970 - 2024, through Upswell Press.

Personal life Gemes' son, Orlando Gemes, born in London in 1975, is pictured with Essie Coffey OAM in a portrait at the National Portrait Gallery. He travelled with his mother as she documented Aboriginal people and activism.

Selected exhibitions 1982, 5 – 26 November: We wait no more Hogarth Gallery & Apmira 1985, 26 October: Gemes created a visual document of the historic Uluru Handback Ceremony at Uluru NT. 1989, from 19 December: Literary Images, Jacqueline Mitelman, Virginia Wallace-Crabbe and Juno Gemes. Special collections section, library of the Australian Defence Force Academy, launched by Robin Wallace-Crabbe 2005, 30 June to 30 November: Our Community exhibition, National Museum of Australia, Canberra 2005, 12 July – 10 September: PROOF: Portraits from The Movement 1978–2003 National Portrait Gallery and Macquarie University Gallery 10 March – 10 May 2004. 2016, November–December: Gemes' work was included in an exhibition at Carriageworks in Redfern, Sydney, celebrating the 40th anniversary of NAISDA Dance College, called Naya Wa Yugali ("We Dance" in Darkinyung language). 2019: Juno Gemes: The Quiet Activist, A Survey Exhibition 1979–2019 2019, 17 – 29 September: group show entitled Three Women Artists In Country, Maunsel Wickes at Barry Stern Galleries