Ink: The Art of Mark-Making
19 September - 2 November 2025
Ink: The Art of Mark-Making
Carlos Bautista
Carlos Bautista, CONICA (detail), 2024, Ink drawing on amate paper (traditional Mexican bark paper), 120 x 120cm. Image courtesy the artist.
We are pleased to announce that following unforeseen international customs delays, the artworks Carlos intended to display have finally arrived and been installed at Umbrella. Please re-visit to see the new works before the exhibition closes 1pm Sunday 2 November.
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Ink: The Art of Mark-Making presents work by Carlos Bautista, a Mexico City-born artist drawing on the landscapes and traditions of Oaxaca (State of Mexico). He brings together ink, paper, and skin in a thoughtful exploration of contemporary and ancestral mark-making. The project combines printmaking and live tattooing to reflect on the body as both a surface and a site of meaning.
Through both prints and tattoo performance, Bautista explores themes of nature, transformation, and memory. His practice connects personal and cultural histories, with each mark - on skin or paper - carrying narratives shaped by place and time. The exhibition invites audiences to consider how symbols and stories are carried across generations and ancestors, and how the act of marking can embed intimacy and meaning in place.
Exhibitions launch
6pm Friday 19 September 2025
Speeches from approx. 6:30pm.
Umbrella Floortalk
9:30am Saturday 27 September
Full details here.
Please note: Umbrella will be closed for exhibitions install from 1pm Sunday 14 September until the exhibitions launch 6pm Friday 19 September. Umbrella's usual opening hours will then resume.
This exhibition is presented at Umbrella Studio Contemporary Arts by the North Australian Festival of Arts.
Carlos Bautista (b. México City, 1985), studied Visual Arts in the city of Cuernavaca Mor, graduating in 2009. He specialised in drawing and graphics with a postgraduate degree in Pedagogy and Teaching of the Arts. Since then he has participated in numerous group exhibitions and has held more than 20 solo exhibitions. He has also expanded across disciplines to produce works in tattooing and intervention in public spaces, but with drawing still as the technical basis for the work.
The ideas and narratives of Bautista's work are led by contemplation, internalisation and spiritual meditation, intertwined with his experiences in, and representations of nature. His work invites the viewer to into a closeness to earth, sky and oneself. His representations invite us to confront the spirit of things, associating ideas of the earthly and human with the heavenly and abstract. Since 2010 Bautista has lived and worked in the Sierra Sur of Oaxaca, in a small town high in the mountains called "San José del Pacífico". Here he shares his personal life honestly and consistently through his work, alongside his family in the Oaxacan forests. From the mountains he studiously nurtures his work with sensitive experiences and a deep connection with nature.
Also on display during this period
All Exhibitions
![Mere Porvaj [I Am Remembering]](http://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/os-data-2/umbrella/images/pageattached/927/blogskale_shivanjani-lal-linden--20240531_dsc0953-edit.jpg)
Open Hours
Tues - Fri: 9am-5pm
Sat - Sun: 9am-1pm
Gallery closed Mondays, public holidays and during exhibition install weeks.
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Contact
408 Flinders Street,
Gurambilbarra / Townsville,
Qld, 4810 Australia
PO Box 2394,
Gurambilbarra / Townsville,
Qld, 4810 Australia
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Acknowledgement of Country
Umbrella Studio Contemporary Arts respectfully acknowledges the Wulgurukaba of Gurambilbarra and Yunbenun and the surrounding groups of our region - Bindal, Gugu Badhun, Nywaigi, Warrgamay, Bandjin and Gudjal - as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we gather, share and celebrate local creative practice. We pay our respects to Elders past and present. We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders as the first people of Australia. They have never ceded sovereignty and remain strong in their enduring connection to land and Culture.
Umbrella is a Member & Signatory of the Indigenous Art Code. This means we are committed to fair and ethical trade with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists, and transparency in the promotion and sale of artwork. As a Dealer Member and signatory to the Code we must act fairly, honestly, professionally and in good conscience in all direct or indirect dealings with artists.
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Acknowledgements
Umbrella is supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland, part of the Department of Education, and the Visual Art, Craft and Design Framework, an initiative of the Australian, state and territory governments. | Umbrella is supported by the Tim Fairfax Family Foundation and receives funding from Creative Australia through the Australian Cultural Fund. | Townsville City Council is a funding partner of Umbrella's program. | Vetta Creative is Umbrella's fortieth anniversary creative partner.
