Ames Yavuz presents Symbolic Nature, an exhibition by Brook Andrew, marking the artist’s first presentation with the gallery in London. 

Working across collage, sculpture, and assemblage, Andrew examines belief systems through recurring materials gathered from friends, family and collaborators: stones, bells, shells, wood, feathers, many of which hold ceremonial significance across diverse cultures. Through these elements, he traces how objects and images accumulate meaning, memory and power over time. 

Drawing on historical representations and interweaving them with his own drawings of Indigenous social and ceremonial life from his Wiradjuri Nation and neighbouring Nations, Andrew reconfigures and challenges the romanticisation of Indigenous Australian cultures. 

Central to the exhibition is the idea of ceremony, held within the artworks themselves and within the exhibition space. Objects are embedded, layered or partially concealed, creating an environment in which meaning is revealed slowly, in relation to context, care and time. 

Within the installation, the floating diamond forms reference Wiradjuri dendroglyphs, Marara, carved into living trees to mark graves and honour the dead. Most were destroyed or removed during British colonial expansion, and the few that survive are now held largely in Western museums, including the University of Oxford collections where Andrew completed his PhD. 

By invoking these forms, Brook highlights the ongoing entanglement between Western institutions and First Nations knowledge systems, pointing to enduring colonial legacies and the unresolved debates around repatriation, cultural authority, and ethical stewardship.