Nani Puspasari’s ‘Things I Carried Quietly’ at Counihan Gallery

At Counihan Gallery in Brunswick, the quietest exhibition of the season is also the one that wants your handwriting. Since 2 May, visitors have been leaving pencil sketches and short notes about objects they once held dear – a chipped teacup, a childhood toy, a key to a house in another country – and the gallery wall is slowly filling with these fragments of memory.

The exhibition is Things I Carried Quietly, a solo show by Melbourne artist Nani Puspasari. Her hand-built ceramics, paintings and drawings fill the main space at 233 Sydney Road, but the participatory project called Objects Once Held is what has turned a static display into a living community archive.

Puspasari, who is of Chinese-Indonesian background, makes work that sits somewhere between playfulness and longing. Hybrid fruits, altered household objects, forgotten toys and shy animals appear in arrangements that suggest closeness without resolution. The floor-based installations ask you to move carefully – you’re looking down as much as up.

The ceramic pieces have a tenderness to them. A pair of objects leaning into each other just slightly, a figurine with oversized ears, a painted plate that carries a single word. It’s the kind of work that rewards you for slowing down. The show doesn’t shout about migration or displacement; it whispers in the language of things left behind and homes remade.

Objects Once Held invites anyone who walks in to draw or write about a meaningful object from their own life. The contributions are added to a shared display that grows thicker as the exhibition runs. By the time the show closes on 19 July, the installation will be a collective portrait of what Merri-bek’s diverse communities carry with them.

There are two ways to experience this exhibition. One is to come as an observer – to take in the ceramics, the brushwork, the quiet choreography of objects. The other is to arrive ready to contribute, to spend ten minutes with a piece of paper and add your own memory to the wall. The show works either way, but the second option leaves you feeling you’ve been part of building something.

Entry is free and no booking is needed, but check opening hours before you go – Counihan Gallery is inside Brunswick Town Hall and its hours can shift during council events. And because some works sit directly on the gallery floor, wear shoes you’re comfortable watching your step in.

Brunswick station on the Upfield line is a short walk away, and multiple tram routes along Sydney Road will drop you within a block of the gallery. Street parking is scarce during the day, so the train or tram is the better bet.

Sydney Road’s cafes and secondhand shops are the natural pairing. Grab a coffee at one of the Albanian or Turkish bakeries within a couple of hundred metres, then walk through the show. The gallery is also inside Brunswick Town Hall, so check the Merri-bek events calendar for any concurrent community programs or performances.

The exhibition closes 19 July 2026. If you want to see your own contribution become part of the display, earlier visits give your object more time to sit alongside others. The final installation won’t look the same as it does on any given day – and that’s the point.

Puspasari’s work doesn’t resolve the distance between the life you left and the one you live now. It just holds the two close together, like two ceramic pieces that almost touch but never quite lock. At Counihan Gallery, that gap is wide enough for anyone to step inside.