Always soft, Always strong is an exhibition by Meanjin-based multidisciplinary artist Dr Karike Ashworth. The exhibition is currently at Bundaberg Regional Art Gallery until September 2024. This gently provocative exhibition addresses the often contradictory experience of being a woman in a supposedly post-feminist society.

The work in the exhibition covers a selection of works the artist made between 2015 and 2023, many of which developed in response to the artist’s previous touring exhibition, Lamentation, as well as her experiences navigating IVF and the COVID-19 pandemic. The exhibition combines the unassuming intimacy of the domestic together with instances of bemusing hyper-performance.

The exhibition is informed by Ashworth’s feminist epistemological approach; in that she views the world through a woman’s perspective—always. She uses her art practice to build knowledge and understanding of how patriarchal structures like gendered expectations control and contain women.