Rodney Love

Sensorial Loop: 1st Tamworth Textile Triennial 2011

2011-10-14T02:10:00.000-07:00

Sensorial Loop: 1st Tamworth Textile Triennial opened at Tamworth Regional Gallery on Saturday, October 1. I've been a bit slow getting these photos uploaded as I've been studying and had assignments due, and also planning for a trip to China at the end of October. As usual, I've just taken snapshots, so quality is not great, nor have I focused on individual works. An excellent catalogue has been produced which has images of every artist's work. The curator is Patrick Snelling, who was the winner of the Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award earlier this year. The exhibition continues at Tamworth until November 26, then tours for two years.

This photo shows the middle of the gallery. The dress is by Martha McDonald, The Weeping Dress. It was used in a performance piece, and the video is displayed with the dress. The fabric pieces on the left are Verity Prideaux's A Legacy of Day. The panels behind the dress are Elisa Markes-Young's The Strange Quiet of Things Misplaced #37.

The works on the plinths in the foreground are by Julie Montgarrett, Circumstance. Going Bush: Beardo by Sera Waters is on the back wall on the right.

Different views of the same works, and with my work, Silence, in the corner on the right. I wanted it to be seen from across the gallery because up close it's more difficult to see. The plinth is 176cm high, so not everyone is able to see the figures or the textile up close.

On the wall on the right is Interlaced Manuscript 3 by Carly Scoufos.

I think all the works on the wall on the left are by Meredith Hughes (Image Portal), the piece in the middle is Jennifer Robertson's The Making of a Slow Journey. The red piece is hemispheres: drawn to you, still by Michele Elliot.

The hanging work is Would you like some cake? by Tania Spencer. Anton Veenstra's Sailor Boy (and another work) is in the middle, and Family Portrait (Friday) by Demelza Sherwood is on the right.

Demelza's work again, Cresside Collette's Twenty Four Evocations of the Wet/Dry Landscape, and The Dusting Cloth by Belinda Von Mengersen.

Another view of The Dusting Cloth, then Cecilia Heffer's Contemporary Lace - An Aerial Landscape Suite.

Framework by Esther Paleologos is the hanging work on the left. Brook Morgan's Untitled is in the middle, and Paula do Prado's Almas Gemelas/Twin Souls is hanging on the right.

Paula's work again, then Alana Clifton-Cunningham's Second Glance, and I am part of a living city by Michelle Harmer.

This last work is Lucy Irvine's The Traveller.

I haven't had professional shots of my work taken as the plinth was made for the work by the gallery, and I didn't see it complete until I went to the opening. My not-very-good shot is below. A better photo is at the end of the post.

A close-up shot of the textile which is over the top of the work.

The opening weekend included a number of artist's talks. These photos aren't in chronological order. The first is Tania Spencer.

Two shots of me giving my talk.

Elisa Markes-Young

Demelza Sherwood

Carly Scoufos

Brook Morgan

Belinda Von Mengersen

Anton Veenstra

Alana Clifton-Cunningham

Elisa's partner Christopher Young is a photographer, and he took some infinitely better photos of the show and the artists' talks. The photo of me is from this post of his blog The Zebra-Factory.

This photo of Silence is from this post.

Christopher has also given more thoughtful remarks about the works in the show. Here is his description of my work:

"Rodney Love's work - a collection of figures shrouded by a cloth - was installed on top of a plinth which approximated his own height. This made the viewing of the work in close proximity obviously very difficult but nonetheless invited effort and curiosity from viewers. He was rather dismissive of his personal reasoning behind this particular work in his artist talk and statement with his rationale being that the ambiguity in the work should encourage narrative development (or access) on behalf of the viewer. That said, there were many conflicts in the work that I found interesting and that require addressing.

"The major one being that the figures are chaotically arranged under the shroud yet the shroud itself is refined and beautifully made. The later aspect appears then ritualistic rather than a simple, respectful covering of the recently (and seemingly randomly collected) deceased. The dead are ceremonially arranged symmetrically in most cultures - ie. graves are set in grids - so I'm not sure about the chaos in the work. Ultimately, it reminded of a key work from Walker Evans and how aspects of that work overlap with ideas explored here. That is, without it's caption but within context (together with FSA photographs of depression-era America), it's ambiguity could prove problematic."

Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award 2011 - Exhibition Photos

2011-06-06T16:17:00.000-07:00

Finally I've got around to posting my images of the exhibition and the opening day (it's taken a couple of days). A reminder, as always, that these are just snapshots I've taken, and probably no-one's work is well served by them! They are only meant to show the exhibition as a whole, and the juxtapositions of work. Best to contact the gallery to order a copy of the excellent catalogue if you want better images of the works.

The artists in the show are:

Annie Aitken, Isabel Avendano Hazburn, Nicole Barakat, Jennifer Bartholomew, Wanda Bennett, Veronica Cay, Alana Clifton-Cunningham, Cresside Collette, Sujora Conrad, Adrienne Doig, Daniel Edwards, Esmae Emerson, Hilary Green, Tim Gresham, Mandy Gunn, Cecilia Heffer, Gabriella Hegyes, Judy Hooworth, Lucy Irvine, Adrienne Kenafake, Anita Larkin, Rodney Love, Penny Malone, Elisa Markes-Young, Paull McKee, Ian McKinnon, Julie Montgarrett, Brook Morgan, Catherine O'Leary, John Parkes, Flossie Peitsch, Martine Peters, Teresa Poletti Glover, Karen Richards, Jennifer Robertson, Barbara Rogers, Julie Ryder, Nicky Schonkala, Joy Smith, Patrick Snelling, Anton Veenstra, Carmel Wallace

The first thing I noticed when I looked at the catalogue was how many of the names I knew. I realized I'd been in other shows with half of the artists. These shows and these artists:

Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award 2009 - Cresside Collette, Hilary Green, Tim Gresham, Mandy Gunn, Cecilia Heffer, Anita Larkin, Penny Malone, Julie Montgarrett, Julie Ryder, Patrick Snelling

Momentum: The 18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial - Alana Clifton-Cunningham, Hilary Green, Mandy Gunn, Cecilia Heffer, Penny Malone, Elisa Markes-Young

Hands On: Craft in Contemporary Art - Annie Aitken, Anton Veenstra

Re-Frame - Nicole Barakat, Paull McKee

Entanglement - Hilary Green, Brook Morgan,

Landscapes: A Journey Home in Textiles - Brook Morgan

Luggage... Not Baggage - Gabriella Hegyes

Furr - Nicole Barakat

I've put the images in the order you'd see them if you entered the gallery, went to the right, and continued around the exhibition until you get back to the entrance. It was intermittently sunny that day, so occasionally the sun bursts into the photos. This is the view from the gallery door, with Elisa Markes-Young's The Strange Quiet of Things Misplaced #27:

From right to left (all subsequent photos will be R to L as well), Penny Malone's Diptych Melbourne Geometrics, My Tool Set by Joy Smith on the plinth, and Curious Wonder by Martine Peters:

A group shot:

Annie Aitken's Untitled #1, Brook Morgan's Untitled, and Cocoon #10 by Carmel Wallace:

A closer look at Brook's work. Made from protea flowers:

Carmel's work again, Kneecap by Isabel Avendano Hazbun, and genes/jeans by John Parkes:

This is around the corner, the back of the previous wall. Hillary Green's Wonderlust, and two works by Adrienne Doig:

Anita Larkin's Roger, I hear you loud and clear... is just behind the person's head, Ride a Wild Pony by Jennifer Bartholomew, and Ian McKinnon's Cascading Black and Tan:

Bartholomew and McKinnon's works again, and Mandy Gunn's TEXT-ile (The Unconcise Oxford Dictionary):

Mandy's work, and Nicole Barakat's obscured I am singing as I am sewing:

Nicole's work again, hmmm..., I'm not sure... Is this Julie Montagarrett's mise en abyme? No, by process of elimination I've realized it must be Tim Gresham's Liquid Module VI. Weavolution is next, by Nicky Schonkala, and Barbara Rogers' Parallels:

Anton Veenstra's Homage to El Greco Sebastian (Never felt a wound) on the wall, and Lucy Irvine's The Traveller. This was my pick to win. It didn't, but it did get an Honourable Mention:

A full shot of The Traveller, with Judy Hooworth's Black Water behind:

Julie Ryder's Transmorphing, and Pulse by Wanda Bennett. It has LED lighting incorporated into the work, but it doesn't really show up well here:

Wagga - Blue by Paull McKee, Esmae Emerson's Glacier, and Ecocover Panel by Flossie Peitsch:

Another overview. I think Veronica Cay's Sleep Little Babies is on a plinth to the right of Hilary's tapestry:

The Wanderlust is in the vitrine and is by Adrienne Kenafake, Patrick Snelling's winning work 8.9, and Teresa Poletti Glover's Every darkness promises a new dawn on a plinth behind the viewer:

A shot of my work Fence on the plinth behind, and Fences in front. They're all woven with a wire warp, and paper weft. The wire has rusted, staining the paper with random patterns:

A different view. Professional shots are in this post:

Cecillia Heffer's Tide, my works again, The making of a Slow Journey by Jennifer Robertson:

Another shot of that corner:

Sujora Conrad's #5 from Drawings for Field Work, and Wave... by Gabriella Hegyes:

I clearly wasn't paying enough attention at the time - I think this is mise en abyme by Julie Montgarrett on the right. Catherine O'Leary's Heartache is the red and white felt work hanging on the left:

Alana Clifton-Cunningham's Pauldron, and Metallic Sun-Orchids by Karen Richards. I'm not sure what the thread is, but it has picked up the flash. It wasn't as luminous in the flesh:

Back to the entrance. Woven Rhythms by Daniel Edwards, and A Trio of New Horizons by Cresside Collette:

This is gallery director Dianne Mangan opening proceedings:

Judge Valerie Kirk and Award Patron Liz Williamson:

Di introducing Liz:

The opening morning:

Winner of the 2011 Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award

2011-06-05T05:46:00.000-07:00

I got back today from Wangaratta (and the surrounding region for a weekend away), and thought I should at least reveal the winner of the Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award for 2011. I have got a lot of photos to upload, but for now I'm happy to say that Patrick Snelling won the (I think) $5,000, acquisitive award for his piece 8.9. The judge was Valerie Kirk. She also selected 4 works for Honourable Mentions - work by Brook Morgan, Lucy Irvine, Elisa Markes-Young, and, Jennifer Bartholomew. I'll add photos of the show in the next few days.

June 6
Here's a picture of Patrick Snelling in front of his winning work:

This is an image of Valerie Kirk, the judge, and Liz Williamson, the Award Patron, in front of Patrick's work:

Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award 2011 Invitation

2011-05-31T01:51:00.000-07:00

(The winner is revealed in this post)

The Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award opens this coming Saturday, June 4, from 11:00am. It will be followed by a textile forum with Valerie Kirk, Mandy Gunn and Anthony Camm presenting, then 4 of the exhibiting artists giving floor talks - Lucy Irvine, Ian McKinnon, Catherine O'Leary and Joy Smith. Details below. I'm heading down there for 2 nights, just for a weekend getaway. More details of other exhibitions in the Wangaratta Gallery here. I still haven't seen a list of artists in the exhibition, but I'll update after I've been down at the weekend.

Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award 2011

2011-05-01T04:59:00.000-07:00

(The winner is revealed in this post)

The Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award exhibition is coming up, opening on June 4. Two of my works have been accepted for the show. I was also in the inaugural award exhibition two years ago (see this post). This first work is called Fence. It's woven with a galvanised steel wire warp, and a paper weft. The wire was then allowed to rust, staining the paper. The title came because the coils of woven wire reminded me of fences waiting to be rolled out across the landscape.

(Original images here.) Until recent rains and flooding, the dominant discourse about the countryside was the drought that had been causing hardship to farmers across the country. The rusted paper in Fence made me think of abandoned farms, rusted fences, and the brown, dusty soil of drought-affected farms.

(Image by Jason Edwards, available here.)

The other work accepted into the show is called Fences. It is a series of three works similar to Fence, but the paper used for the weft is hand made and includes human hair, plant material, pigments, and spices. The works were all made earlier this year. They are all about 15cm wide, with varying lengths. All are displayed coiled, but there is no set configuration for them.

Forgot to mention that all photos are by Adrian Cook.

Hands On exhibition photos

2011-01-06T21:16:00.000-08:00

This post has images I took at Hazelhurst Regional Gallery & Arts Centre of the Hands On: Craft in Contemporary Art show that I'm exhibiting in. They're just snapshots I took in the gallery, without tripod or lighting changes, so not great quality. They at least give an overview of the show. It's a great space, and the work has been well placed by curator Cash Brown. The show has a great variety of textile techniques and materials, and it all works really well together. The information about works is from the catalogue, so I may not have all the correct details. I also don't have images of all the artists' work.

The work in the shot above is Say it with flowers by Linelle Stepto. What looks like a dried flower arrangement is made from cane toad skin and kangaroo fur. Below are 8 pieces from my The Devil's Cloth series:

Here's something I wrote about this series:

"The medieval eye found any surface in which a background could not be distinguished from a foreground disturbing. Thus, striped clothing was relegated to those on the margins or outside the social order -- jugglers and prostitutes, for example -- and in medieval paintings the devil himself is often depicted wearing stripes."

Publisher's blurb from The Devil's Cloth: A History of Stripes and Striped Fabric by Michel Pastoureau

I was intrigued by this book's investigation of striped fabrics from medieval times to the present. Pastoureau also writes about the striped uniforms that concentration camp inmates were forced to wear in the mid-twentieth century. The Holocaust has been a recurring theme in my work, and the use of human hair is a link to that event. The patterns I have used in this series are mainly taken from Japanese fabrics, so the meanings that may have applied in 13th century Europe obviously do not apply. I hope, however, that viewers can draw out and connect these many meanings when they think about the material, the pattern and the technique combining in this series of woven works.

In this photo, Newell Harry's Untitled is on the left, Braveheart, take 4 by Dani Marti in the middle, and Phone book fashion by Betty Bird in the foreground:

Silke Raetze's Mayflower series is on the left, Peace in the Universe by Jedda-Daisy Culley, not sure of the next work, but in the case in the foreground is, I think, Rockers in my back yard by Cecilia Fogelberg:

Another view of Cecilia Fogelberg's work, with, I think, Leah Emery's The Exhibition on the wall:

A series of applique and embroidery works on linen by Adrienne Doig is on the back wall, with Alan Jones' Todd on the right, and woven polyester mono filament sculptures by Minka Gillian in the foreground:

On the wall behind Alan Jones' work are some works by Narelle Jubelin and Barbara Campbell I think collectively called Refer to Source. On the facing wall is embroidery by Timothy Moore:

Catherine Hearse's figures are on the plinth on the left, Michelle Hamer's Only a little bit dead on the wall, the large sculpture is Auropod by Alice Lang, and Adrienne Kneebone's Town'n'Kantri is on the plinth in the background:

Bridie Connell's Hanky Panky Fiction is on the left, Symbiosis #17 by Annie Aitken is next, my work is in the background. Helen Pynor's sculptural hair work Untitled (heart lungs) is in a perspex box on the wall on the right. It's the exhibition invitation image:

Some works by Anton Veenstra on the left, the back view of Todd, Narelle Jubelin and Barbara Campbell's work again, and, I think, Ingrid Wimbury's Liminal Rituals #2:

Hands On: Craft in Contemporary Art

2010-12-01T16:29:00.000-08:00

Hands On: Craft in Contemporary Art, an exhibition curated by Cash Brown, opens this Friday at Hazelhurst Regional Gallery in Gymea. It runs from December 4 - January 30, 2011. I'm exhibiting some pieces from my The Devil's Cloth series, the first time I've exhibited any of them (I mentioned them in an earlier post here). It includes artists:

Annie Aitken, Betty Bird, Nicolette Benjamin Black, Patricia Casey, Bridie Connell, Jedda-Daisy Culley, Adrienne Doig, Leah Emery, Kirsten Fredericks, Cecilia Fogelberg, Minka Gillian, Michelle Hamer, Newell Harry, Catherine Hearse, Alan Jones, Narelle Jubelin & Barbara Campbell, Adrienne Kneebone, Alice Lang, Rodney Love, Dani Marti, Timothy Moore, Sarah Nolan, Jessica Emily Price, Helen Pynor, Silke Raetze, Linelle Stepto, Anton Veenstra, and Ingrid Wimbury.

Momentum at Jam Factory

2010-10-28T02:08:00.000-07:00

The final leg of the Momentum: 18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial 2008 tour opens at Adelaide's Jam Factory tomorrow night.

Meta4 at Artereal Gallery

2010-08-28T01:35:00.000-07:00

And Artereal Gallery has a blog, with a Q&A with me about the work in this show.

Six Degrees Exhibition Wangaratta

2010-07-05T03:43:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I went to rural Victoria for a textile symposium organised by the Wangaratta Exhibitions Gallery to coincide with the opening of the Petite show of textile miniatures, and my own show in the Wangaratta Performing Arts Centre. My show was called Six Degrees. The invitation is above. Parts of two series were shown - four pieces from the woven-human-hair Six Degrees series, and fourteen sock panels from the I Am Because We Are installation. I gave a presentation at the symposium on the evolution of one strand of my art practice that led to the two series on display.

Textile Symposium/Six Degrees Exhibition

2010-06-29T21:10:00.000-07:00

This weekend I'm flying down to the Victorian town of Wangaratta for a textile symposium, and the opening of an exhibition of work of mine at the Wangaratta Performing Arts Centre.

RODNEY LOVE

SIX DEGREES

Wangaratta Performing Arts Centre
Foyer Gallery
3 - 25 July 2010

Sydney artist Rodney Love presents two series of works that are based on double weave techniques and his conceptual ideas about groups and individuals - how they relate to one another, how one shapes the other, how they are connected.

Including the names of the people who donated the hair and socks to be woven, the works become a commemorative object, taking Rodney into his current research into memorials and monuments.

I'll be giving a presentation at the Symposium about my work, and how the links between my conceptual concerns, techniques and materials have made my work evolve the way it has.

2010 Textile Symposium
Symposium, Dinner, Exhibitions, Workshops

3 - 7 July 2010

Textile artists and enthusiasts are encouraged to participate in this exciting program of textile-related talks, exhibitions and workshops.

The main symposium from 10am-3.30pm on Saturday 3 July will include keynote speakers Lorraine Connelly-Northey, Sylvia Kleinert, Rodney Love, Louise Saxton and Cheryl Thornton.

Workshops run over the following four days include Indigenous Basket Weaving, Miniature Suzanis, Machine Embroidery and Freeform Crochet.

Exhibitions include Flourish, Petite, Ensemble (Wangaratta exhibitions Gallery Collection) and Six Degrees (Rodney Love).

To download the full program (PDF 640kb) please click here

Prêt-à-Voir Exhibition Launch

2010-06-18T02:38:00.000-07:00

I've got a small show of paintings opening tomorrow at Art2Muse gallery in Double Bay. The gallery website has all the size details of the works.

Even More New Paintings

2010-06-02T21:39:00.001-07:00

Some more of the paintings that I've finished recently for my upcoming show.

More New Paintings

2010-04-11T01:13:00.000-07:00

Momentum at Hawkesbury Regional Gallery

2010-04-01T04:27:00.000-07:00

Momentum:18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Bienniale is currently on show at the Hawkesbury Regional Gallery in Windsor, about one and a half hours from the centre of Sydney. I wasn't able to get to the opening last Friday, but I had a day off yesterday and drove up there. It's a really good hang of the show, made possible by a good range of moveable barriers in the gallery space. My photos aren't great, just snapshots, some a little wobbly, but I've tried to get a shot of all the works so that they can be seen in context. The show continues until May 2, so if you're in Sydney, this is the closest it will get to you, and the best opportunity to see the show.

This is the view when you walk into the exhibition space:

Annabelle Collett's Neo-Camo Installation is on the left, and From the Heart 1 by Christine Atkins on the right:

From left to right: works from Annie Trevillian's Bodywrap Series; Tinkering with Nature - A Decorative Response by Vicki Mason; re-collection:specimens 1-67 by Louise Saxton; and a series of woven rings by Jane Bowden:

Lucille Martin's Lace Tree; Elefteria Vlavianos' the Touch series on the far wall; Fiona Gavino's Perspectives Shift on the plinth; and Cecilia Heffer's Shadow Traces:

Kelly Leonard's A Weaver's Perspective; Burn Out Series by Mandy Gunn; my work Six Degrees; and then 2 printed textiles from Maningrida's Babbarra Designs - Susan Marrawar's Black and White Fish Traps, and Deborah Wurrkidj's Purple, Orange and Green Dilly Bag and Fish Trap:

Elefteria Vlavianos' the Touch series again; Liz Jeneid's work Tea Party; My Eiffels by Debra Porch; Kelly Leonard and Mandy Gunn's work again:

Debra Porch's work is quite small and I don't think I've had a close-up detail of the work before:

The entrance is on the left here. Penny Malone's Gum Blossom and Fashion Fan is on the right:

Two works by Melissa Hirsch on the far right wall (the red and white coral works):

Jill Kinnear's work are on the left - Diaspora Paisley 3 Shawl and related works:

Hilary Green's 70 Tonnes Per Scoop is in the centre, and another shot of Jill Kinnear's work:

Ainslie Murray's An Architecture of Thread and Gesture is behind the first barrier, and the three white works are by Robyn Glade-Wright:

Demelza Sherwood's stitched drawings are on the right:

Here are Elisa Markes-Young's works in the show:

A very poor shot of Alana Clifton-Cunningham's Second Skin series:

When I went to the gallery I met Prue Charlton, from Marketing and Audience Development at the gallery. Here's a photo of me with my work, and with gallery volunteer Tarja Wright:

New Paintings

2010-02-13T01:06:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted anything recently. I've been busy with, well, I'd like to say my art, but just life really. I have managed to finish off some new works for a show of paintings I'm having in June. I'm calling the show Prêt-à-Voir, and it's going to be at the Art2Muse Gallery in Double Bay.

Blue Paintings

2010-01-16T22:03:00.000-08:00

This is a series of paintings that I've referred to elsewhere. I've only recently finished the last of the panels. The first four that I finished are included in the Liverpool City Art Prize, which continues until February. They have been temporarily joined together as the last image shows.
Each work is acrylic and carbon on panel, 15 x 20cm.

Hate and Envy and Crime and Darkness and Pain 3

2009-12-24T18:53:00.000-08:00

Hate and Envy and Crime and Darkness and Pain 2

2009-12-24T18:34:00.000-08:00

I've got three posts (here and here) about the exhibition Hate and Envy and Crime and Darkness and Pain which I had in 2007 at Kudos Gallery. I thought it'd be better to spread them out rather than have them all in one post. All three posts are starting with these four shots of the overall exhibition:

I had these five hair boxes at the front entrance, in lieu of the title of the exhibition.

Here is a series of light globe sculptures. The hanging works are Comfortably Numb. The work on the right is Visions of the Apocalypse. The piece in front is Life Be In It, and the one at the back is Untitled (Life Be In It II).

Three grid works - top left is Hate and Envy and Crime and Darkness and Pain, on the right is Walking Among the Fires of Hell, Delighted With the Enjoyments of Genius, Which to Angels Look Like Torment and Insanity, and bottom left is The Stepford Wives.

Wire doll works - from left to right, Fall of the Rebel Angels, The Part That Wants Beauty to Suffer (a title I've used for another work in the past - and this work, when it was covered in chicken skin, was known as The Man Who Eats Meat Cannot Sneer at the Butcher), and Weltschmerz.

Some small sculptural works: The drawing pin cup is Tea and Sympathy, the shoe is Happily Ever After, and the ceramic eggs are Population Explosion.

This floor work is made from burnt light tubes. It's called the Dan Flavin I'd Like To See.

Hate and Envy and Crime and Darkness and Pain 1

2009-12-24T18:21:00.000-08:00

Art2Muse Christmas Miniature Exhibition

2009-12-04T03:08:00.001-08:00

The Art2Muse Christmas Miniature Exhibition will be launched this Saturday, December 5, from 12-2pm at the Art2Muse Gallery in Double Bay. The exhibition continues until December 23. The address and map are at the end of the post.

Miniature paintings by Art2Muse artists:
Georgie Gall, Meredith Gaston, Fong Fai, Lyndal Campbell, Fiona Goulding, Larissa Blake, Charles Hebert, Natasha Milne, Claude Jones, Skye Andrew, James Boissett, Rodney Love, Donna Ravenscroft, Grace Garrett, Andre Stefan White, Sally McDonald, Ami Summers, Jo Kot, Alisa Teletovic

I'm including the following paintings. They were made as part of a series, and are the only ones remaining. They are acrylic on canvas board, all 6"x8".

The address is 475A New South Head Rd, Double Bay, on the corner of Bellevue Rd. There is parking on Bellevue Rd., or free one-hour parking on Cross St. We are next to the Double Bay Gallery on Bellevue Rd.

Liverpool City Art Prize Catalogue

2009-11-26T01:39:00.001-08:00

The catalogue for the Liverpool City Art Prize.

The National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial

2009-11-17T01:40:00.000-08:00

This post continues my series looking at memorials I researched for my MFA thesis. This one is The National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington, D.C. All quotes are from the website, but all photographs are mine:
"It honors all of America's federal, state and local law enforcers. Inscribed on the Memorial's blue-gray marble walls are the names of more than 18,600 officers who have been killed in the line of duty, dating back to the first known death in 1792."

"Designed by Washington, DC architect Davis Buckley, the Memorial sits on three acres of federal park land called Judiciary Square. The site has served for over 200 years as the seat of our nation's judicial branch of government. A glance around the space finds plush carpets of grass, nearly 60,000 plants and 128 trees decorating the Memorial grounds. Each year, around the first of April, some 14,000 daffodils make the Memorial one of Washington's most spectacular attractions."

"Bordering the Memorial's beautifully landscaped park are two tree-lined "pathways of remembrance" where the names of the fallen officers are engraved."

"The names of the fallen officers are displayed in random order on the Memorial Wall. At an annual candlelight vigil held each year during National Police Week (in May) new names of fallen officers are added to the Memorial."

"Each of the pathway entrances is adorned with a powerful statuary grouping of an adult lion protecting its cubs. The bronze statues were sculpted by Raymond Kaskey. They symbolize the protective role of our law officers and convey the strength, courage and valor that are the hallmarks of those who serve in law enforcement."
(I didn't think the lions were "powerful" - in fact I think they're a bit cheesy, and the symbolism is heavy handed.)

"Under each of the lion statues are inspiring quotes that capture the spirit of the Memorial and the heroic men and women it recognizes"

"In valor there is hope."
-Tacitus

"It is not how these officers died that made them heroes, it is how they lived."
- Vivian Eney Cross, Survivor

"The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are as bold as a lion."
- Proverbs 28:1

"Carved on these walls is the story of America, of a continuing quest to preserve both democracy and decency, and to protect a national treasure that we call the American dream."
- President George H.W. Bush

This is a rubbing I took of the above section:

I Am Because We Are Panels 2

2009-11-15T01:49:00.000-08:00

This post continues the look at the sock panels that made up the I Am Because We Are installation. This work was made for the floor of the installation (above), but in the recent Landscapes: A Journey Home in Textiles show at Kudos Gallery it was exhibited running from the wall down onto the floor. The reason I embarked on this part of the project (naming the people whose socks make up each of the sections) is so that when I exhibit the work and people ask, "Are my socks in this one?" I can direct them here to check. The list of names below has some of the names repeated. This was because I used a number of different socks of theirs to make sure that I had variety in the colours of the panels. The names are typed onto ribbon which is woven in with the socks (the white strips you can see in the photos).

Andrew Metcalfe, Sandra Burchill, Ian Howard, Margaret Jackson, Anda Black, Bill Mobbs, Illona Caldow, Noel Love, Richard Brown, Ingrid Davis, Kennie Ward, Kevin Russell, Nancy Hall, Linda Jaivin, Paul Cordeiro, Peter Black, Harry Lukies, Quinn Cretney-Ross, Vivienne Webb, Sue Olive, Pat House, Andrew Gwinnett, Laila Marie Costa, Phillip Black, James Staniforth-Smith, Tony Napoli, Sally Hill, Libby Knott, Greg Cook, Peter Perry, Tim Lever, Myles Wearring, Barbara Mobbs, Charlie Blum, Russell Storer, Tim Smith, Billie Dyer, Roy Milton, Ada Markby, Joy Wellings, Kay Lyon, Peter Wong, Renata Joy Field, Miki Wakatsuki, Vanila Netto, Peter Black, Scott Maclennan, Siobhan Punshon, Donna Page, Jan Blum, Rebecca Reynolds, Allan Giddy, Jenya Osborne, Paraskevi Zafiriou, Alice Engel, Isolde Lennon, Tim Lever, Liddy Roulston, Ingrid Davis, Marianne Little, Rahayu Agustina, Ella Freer, Colleen Drew, Jenna Bateman, Sandra Eterovic, Virginia Baldwin, Margaret King, Jenya Osborne, Liddy Roulston, Peggy Smith, Kevin Greene, Dominick Rosenthal, Kristin Headlam, Viola Hofer, Gail Stiffe, Kathryn Greiner, Penelope Benton, Micheal Smith, Richard Morris, Mollie Osborne, Emmett O'Shea, Penelope Seidler, Clare Hodgins, Barbara Rogers, Basil Bessiris, Pierre Thibaudeau, Millie Phelan, Lyn Dickson, Gavin Palmer, Kean Wong, Fiona Kennedy, Rex Deutscher, Tamsin Hughes, Mike Stiffe, Phillip Black, Ian Fletcher, Suzanna Tan, Neryl Lewis, Ky Fisher, Linda Jaivin, Sally Sorell, Rex Deutscher, Margaret King, Barbara Rogers, François Limondin, Tineke Hazel, Kevin Greene, Colleen Drew, Val Little, Sandra Burchill, Ada Markby, Emmett O'Shea, Richard Morris

Landscapes: A Journey Home in Textiles Exhibition Shots

2009-10-28T21:20:00.000-07:00

Here are some snapshots I took of the Landscapes: A Journey Home in Textiles exhibition at Kudos Gallery. The show continues until Saturday, November 7.

The first shot is from the entrance, looking into the gallery:

This is going to the left, with Brooke Morgan's Studies in Grass 1 first, then Liz Williamson's Small Remembrances:

Liz's work again, and Gaawaa: Lifeblood, by Lucy Simpson:

This is Urban Palimpsests by Joanna Redestowicz, and Paula do Prado's Flag Work:

This is my Embodied Landscape 1:

This is Embodied Landscape 3 (I Am Because We Are):

And Embodied Landscape 2:

Belinda von Mengersen's Dusting Cloth is on the right:

The quilt in the middle section is called Sydney Twinkle and is by Alison Muir:

More of Alison's work - Aquamarine, Troubled Water, and Medium is the Message, with part of Brook Morgan's installation Studies in Grass 2 in the next section:

Studies in Grass 3 by Brooke:

Sarah Evans, the curator, also put together a great catalogue. Here's the cover and my pages:

Momentum at Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery

2009-10-24T04:02:00.000-07:00

The latest leg of the Momentum: 18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial tour opened tonight at the Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery. It continues until November 29. Here's a link to the MPRG's media release on curator Valerie Kirk's blog.

Landscapes: A Journey Home in Textiles

2009-10-23T22:22:00.000-07:00

This post is about a show that opens next week at Kudos Gallery in Paddington. It's a textiles show featuring the work of a number of COFA students and staff. Details are on the invitation below:

This is my explanation of my work and how it fits the theme of the show:

Embodied Landscapes

The works for this exhibition were all made from old socks. I imagine these socks as people wore them to go about their lives, walking across pavements and parks and suburban streets. They have taken on the energy from the lives they have been connected to; the lived experience has become embodied in these socks. Along the way they have encountered myriad landscapes, the stages upon which our lives are lived. And each time they returned home, they brought those landscapes with them.

With these works I’m not trying to represent a landscape, but merely show the physical products that have moved through various landscapes. With the work from the I Am Because We Are series, not only are the various people joined together by their shared humanity, but also by our shared environment; Not only are our lives shaped by our social experiences, but also by the world that sustains us. As we irrevocably change our landscape, so we change ourselves.

The first two works are both called Embodied Landscapes, and are new this year. Embodied Landscapes 1 is made from only white socks, but the range of shades gives it a feeling of geological strata, meshing with the landscape theme. I've included shots of it stretched out and rolled up. I like both effects.

This is Embodied Landscapes 2. I showed a slightly different configuration of it in this post, before I sewed the individual lengths together. I was inspired by African kente cloth, but it also reminds me of Sean Scully's paintings.

This floor piece was part of the I Am Because We Are installation, but I intended the greens and browns of the colour scheme to evoke a landscape when I made it, so thought it would fit this show, too.

Fiber Arts Article

2009-10-04T05:18:00.000-07:00

This is a feature from the Nov/Dec 2006 issue of Fiberarts magazine called ‘Artists to Watch’ which shows some of my textiles. Well, part of the feature - only the page with my work on it. It shows work from textile students around the world. I was the only student from Australia included that year. The magazine's website also has more images from the students, including one of my sock weavings, here.

Just what is it that makes today's boys so different, so appealing?

2009-09-30T03:44:00.000-07:00

This is a photographic series which I wrote about last year when the Bill Henson naked children controversy flared up. I showed 4 of the images there. Here's the complete series. The series' title is Just What Is It That Makes Today’s Boys So Different, So Appealing? (of course referencing the title of Richard Hamilton’s famous collage). I cropped snapshots of junior high school students from Japan to focus on certain individuals. Here's what I wrote before: "It consists of close-up shots of Japanese students I knew when I lived in Japan. There is nothing sexual about the photos, just snapshots, but the title instantly evokes paedophilic desire. The work was meant to draw attention to the way that paedophiles (or indeed any paraphiliacs) can use images for purposes other than those for which they were intended (for example, collecting advertisements of children in pyjamas, or as David Marr mentioned on Insight, foot fetishists watching The Sound of Music for the scenes where the von Trapps run around in bare feet!)."

This is an installation shot from the Kudos show where I showed them (20 of the 21 photos) years ago:

Liverpool City Art Prize Entry

2009-09-26T22:16:00.000-07:00

The Liverpool City Art Prize entries are closing Friday, October 2. I'm entering a series of paintings. I've been working on these for awhile. I had 5 paintings planned, but have only finished the 4 which I'm entering. I wanted to show the whole series when I finish the last one, so for this post I'm showing preparatory sketches for the paintings.

The first one is a work I showed here when I included it in a Match Box Project show. It's called The Artist Renounces His Decadent Profession.

This work is He's a Rebel.

This work changed from the sketch, mainly because I thought the writing was too small to paint. It's a reworking of a quote from Jenny Holzer (Abuse of power comes as no surprise). Even though the quote is not in the painting, the title is still Abuse of Children Comes as no Surprise.

This is, not surprisingly, Curb Your Animal Instincts.

The four works above are the ones for which I have completed paintings. The one below is still in progress. The title, Scouting for Boys, is also a book by Robert Baden-Powell, the founder of the Scouts movement. No-one seems to have noticed the ambiguity of the title at the time.

Urine Heaven

2009-09-23T03:50:00.001-07:00

The image above is called The Places You Find Love. There was a certain wabi-sabiness about this particular Japanese junior high school bathroom. I thought I'd do a series of photographs of urinals. I think these were all taken in Tokyo. I've never exhibited them. I guess the collective title of the series could be the same as the title above. If nothing else they give an idea of the types of urinals common in Japan today.
Hmmm... I've also realized that the title was supposed to be "You're In Heaven"... Clearly my punning has gotten away from me!

Kill Me

2009-09-22T03:54:00.000-07:00

This is a new painting I finished the other day. I'd found that an acrylic paint I had was cracking when it dried, so I thought I'd use that as a feature of the work. The text came from a friend, possibly dyslexic, or maybe just deranged, who misinterpreted the earlier painting which follows which says MILK. This is on an 8x10" canvas board.

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

2009-09-19T05:39:00.000-07:00

I'm continuing my look back at memorials I researched for my MFA with a study of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.

The above shot is one stretch of the wall. It was impossible to get a shot of the complete memorial because of the number of tourists visiting the site. Below is an article which I originally wrote for The College Voice in July 2006.

VVM & WWII

For my MFA I have been researching memorials around the world. My main interest is group memorials that list the names of individuals, where the individual within the group is just as important as the group itself. I have been looking mainly at war memorials, Holocaust memorials, and memorials to people who have died of AIDS. The people commemorated by a memorial, as well as the people to whom the memorial speaks, affect the design vocabulary that a memorial uses.

During a visit to Washington, D.C., I saw two memorials that provide interesting insights into the uses of memorials and their meanings. The Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial (VVM) and The National World War II Memorial (WWII) are only 500m or so apart, but they occupy vastly different spaces in the American psyche. I offer a brief overview of these two memorials to see how they differ in their symbolic language and meanings. WWII is a national memorial that celebrates the American victory in World War II, remembering the deeds of all those who fought in the war, and not just those who died. The VVM, however, is aimed at the veterans of the war, not the nation, and not in memory of the war itself.

The design of the VVM reflects this emphasis. It is a wall of polished black granite engraved with the names of the dead or missing servicemen from the Vietnam War. The names are arranged in chronological order so that one can see the rise in the number of casualties as the war progressed. And that is all that the memorial has - no arches, no colonnades, no domes. It is a minimalist memorial where the emphasis is on the individuals who died. The WWII has no names of the dead, although it does have the Freedom Wall with its 420 gold stars, each representing approximately 100 dead.

This difference in the type of commemoration (names vs. no names) reflects the emphasis of these two memorials. The WWII is a celebration of life, of liberation from fascism, and for freedom and democracy. The VVM is about remembering dead comrades when the public and government seemed to wish that they would be forgotten - to pretend that the war had never happened. As one walks along the VVM’s walls, one slowly walks downwards until the walls are towering above. This is a descent into the earth, like a grave, with the black granite panels resembling tombstones. The WWII, in contrast, is mostly level with the surrounding ground, it is light and open, and the white stone arches and pillars resemble classical temples rather than a graveyard. The pond and fountain in the centre evoke the middle of a city, a place where people meet and celebrate.

The style of architecture of the WWII fits with its place on the Mall, and the axis of history there. It is between the Washington Monument, and the Lincoln Memorial, and along the same axis as the Capitol building, all built with white stone. A text engraved at the entrance to the memorial explains its historical placement:

HERE IN THE PRESENCE OF WASHINGTON AND LINCOLN,
ONE THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY FATHER, AND THE OTHER THE
NINETEENTH CENTURY PRESERVER OF OUR NATION, WE HONOR
THOSE TWENTIETH CENTURY AMERICANS WHO TOOK UP THE STRUGGLE
DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR AND MADE THE SACRIFICES TO
PERPETUATE THE GIFT OUR FOREFATHERS ENTRUSTED TO US:
A NATION CONCEIVED IN LIBERTY AND JUSTICE.

So World War II was a noble war, and one that affirms America’s sense of itself as a country that has a divine mission to bring freedom to the world.
The Vietnam War clearly doesn’t fit with this view. One view is that the United States sought not to liberate Vietnam, but to prevent its citizens from exercising their democratic right to elect its own government. That, and the fact that the U.S. lost the war, has resulted in this memorial being put to the side of the main axis of history. Even knowing where it was located, I had trouble finding it in the grove of trees which surrounds it. Maya Lin, in her design, however, has attempted to connect the memorial to the history of the nation – one arm of the wall points towards the Washington Monument, and the other towards the Lincoln Memorial.

Although President Clinton signed legislation to establish the WWII Memorial in 1993, it was not dedicated and opened to the public until 2004. I can’t say whether the current administration unduly influenced the shape of the WWII, but I feel the memorial is connected to the current war in Iraq through the use of quotes engraved at various places. On the flagpoles is written:

AMERICANS CAME TO LIBERATE, NOT TO CONQUER,
TO RESTORE FREEDOM AND TO END TYRANNY

And on one of the walls is this quote from General George C. Marshall:

My feeling is that it has been designed not only to celebrate a past war, but also to link the meanings of that war with the current one. It is, in my view, a propaganda exercise designed to remind people of the values that America allegedly stands for, and the rightness of the mission to spread those values around the world.

The VVM, despite the opposition to it in the beginning, has become part of the establishment, and is firmly on the tourist map of Washington. By concentrating on only the names of the dead, Lin was able to focus the memorial away from the contentious war, and towards the sacrifices made by those in the armed forces. Her focus, however, was undermined once the project was underway by those who felt that the memorial wasn’t military enough, and was perhaps too critical of the war, even though this is what makes it successful. After the wall was completed, a sculptural tableau of three soldiers was placed 100m away, and, nearby, a large flagpole flying an American flag has been permanently erected to add further meaning to the memorial site. Of course this is an attempt to make Lin’s design fit in more with the kinds of memorial evoked by the WWII.

These added elements are, to my mind, clumsy and unnecessary, and were strenuously opposed by Lin herself. Along with the rather sorry state of the landscaping around the wall, these parts of the memorial detract from the elegance and simplicity of Lin’s design.

This brief examination of two of dozens of memorials in the U.S. capital illustrates the way that design elements shape the meanings of that which they commemorate. The two wars remembered in these memorials were different kinds of war, and needed to be remembered in different ways. The two memorials, although vastly different in style, are both successful at communicating meaning to the viewer.

Rodney Love is a Master of Fine Arts student in the School of Art.

Photos courtesy of the author.
1. Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, Washington, D. C.
2. National World War II Memorial, Washington, D.C.
3. National World War II Memorial, Washington, D.C.
4. Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, Washington, D.C.

Here are images highlighting some problems with the VVM - too many tourists squeezed onto a small path; not being able to step back to get a wide view of the memorial; poor landscaping around the memorial; tacky fencing to prevent people from walking above the memorial.

Lastly, here's a rubbing I took at the VVM.

I Am Because We Are Panels 1

2009-09-18T01:33:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to post these sock panels individually for awhile now. I wanted to acknowledge the people who donated socks for the I Am Because We Are installation, so I thought I'd show a couple of panels at a time with the list of the donors. These two are the first ones that I wove for this project, so the number of donors was still quite small, hence the same people's socks being in both panels. The fabric has been stretched around wooden frames. My original idea was to have them loose, but stretching them over a frame gave them a solid edge which worked better with the memorial theme that I was researching. The names of the donors have been typed onto ribbons which have been woven in with the sock strips.

This is an installation shot from my MFA grad show which includes the two panels:

Grey panel

Emmett O’Shea, Mark Jones, Natham Turner, Gavin Palmer, Phillip Black, Rex Deutscher, Marianne Little, Sue Olive, Pierre Thibaudeau, Tim Lever, Lyndal Campbell, Miki Wakatsuki, Charlie Blum, Peter Perry, Andrew Metcalfe, Alan Ashton, Sandra Eterovic, Micheal Smith, Margaret King, Sue Best, Bill Mobbs, Kay Lyon, Matthew Hall, Olivier Thibaudeau, Sandra Burchill, Robert Dreyer, Thomas wanner, Peter Black, Illona Caldow

Red, white and blue panel

Barbara Rogers, Judy Bourke, Lee Rhiannon, Lyn Dickson, Jacob Kristensen, Tim Dyce, Nazuna Tomita, Liddy Roulston, Gavin Palmer, Claire Milledge, Mark Smith, Diane Losche, Matthew Cecchin, Greg Ward, Sally Sorell, Vanjy Araujo, Tim Lever, Natham Turner, William Lo Giudice, Sharron Olivier, Hanae Satou, François Limondin, Marina Ely, Sandra Eterovic, Marcel Freer, Rex Deutscher, Kristin Headlam

Sock rope

2009-09-09T05:09:00.000-07:00

In this post I'm showing a work which I proposed as an exhibition in Sculpture by the Sea. It was rejected by SbtS, so I thought I'd use this to reiterate the philosophy of this blog. I'm not trying to show my best work here, or the most successful, or my favourite; I'm showing ALL my work. I've destroyed some past work not because I'm embarrassed by it, or because it might weaken my brand, but because I haven't had enough space to store everything. I'm the artist I am today because of the evolution of my work, because of the work I've made as well as the work I haven't made, the artistic dead-ends, and the works that have sold and gone to appreciative homes. I'm also quite happy for someone to look at some work and say, "Meh, I don't like it," or even, "That's terrible!" I'm not editing the work, just presenting. I'm trying for an autobiographical display, rather than an aesthetic one.

So, given that caveat, what's this work all about? Part of the reason this was rejected is because it's not that well thought out. I'd been collecting socks from people for part of my MFA (click on the Socks link at the end of the post for various sock works), and still had hundreds on hand after making the work. This was an attempt to find some way of using them up. I've plaited them into a giant braid (or have I braided them into a giant plait?). The idea was that this braid would encircle Marks Park at Bondi, one of the locations for Sculpture by the Sea. I guess part of the idea was that these were socks which people had been walking in which were now to be used to delineate a walking space. Or something. I really didn't think it through too well. And the presentation wasn't that great. How was it to be held down? What would happen when it rained? Would people trip over it? I'm still hoping that I can resurrect the idea of the sock rope at some point in the future, not for this location, but in some other form, maybe a lot of shorter ropes hanging from a ceiling? The rope is chunky and colourful, but I'm not really sure what it would mean, which is why I'm blocked with the idea!

I think I stole the idea from Janine Antoni. At the end of the images of my work are two photos of Antoni's work Moor. Here's an excerpt from my book about her work:

Janine Antoni has also used items donated by individuals, but her work is concerned with the individual and the group. Antoni’s Moor, 2001, is a rope made from objects that family and friends had donated to her, all of which were listed during the exhibition. The items include
clothing, hair, Christmas lights, extension cords, towels, etc. Antoni and her assistants cut the items into strips, twisted them, then let strands of these materials twist back onto each other to create a thick rope. The work is a metaphor for connectedness. Antoni says, “A rope is an umbilical cord – it’s something that connects two things. Which, sort of, is what Moor is about. It’s about all these people, you know, my life sort of connecting all these people. The idea was to take all these very different materials, but also lives, and sort of bring them together through the rope-making process.”

In the book that was produced in conjunction with the installation, Antoni lists all the items that are in the rope, to whom they belonged, and a narrative around the object if the donor provided one:

Melissa’s dental floss is used as whipping to secure the beginning of the
rope and it is clasping Danielle’s red reversible jacket, which is black on
the other side and which her roommate Katrin from Germany gave to
her, and she never really wore the jacket and feels like it drifted into her
life the same way that Katrin did and Danielle’s jacket is entwined with a
green t-shirt of Pat’s that “could be up to fifteen years old and I have
worn it all that time so that it was almost completely worn away, and I
could not bear to part with it because it had made it so far” and Pat’s tshirt
is entwined with Glenn’s brown sweater from Old Navy that got
stretched out and “nothing from that store ever lasts” and Glenn’s
sweater is entwined with his friend Byron’s striped velour ‘Hang Ten’ shirt
and Byron is in many ways stuck in the seventies and he wants to be a
surfer and Byron’s shirt is entwined with his wife Lisa’s studio jeans worn
while making her paintings…

Moor not only “extract[s] the poetry that lies latent in all material,” but also shows the connectedness of humanity that has been my concern in I Am Because We Are. All people, regardless of how poor they may be, have some objects, even if only their clothing, that can be used to represent them.

Janine Antoni's work Moor:

I also recently found this last image. It's an installation by Janice Appleton called there is something I need to tell you. I don't know anything about it other than this image, but it looks like a rope made of clothes connects these two outfits.

Hair dolls reconfigured

2009-09-05T21:47:00.000-07:00

This post features combinations of the human hair and wire dolls that I've shown in a couple of earlier posts (here and here). The dolls are all individual, but I liked to show them in groups. Often there was a theme of atrocity and mass murder, but sometimes it was just about injustice done to individuals and groups by those with power. This first work was made around the time of the East Timor killings. I think there were reports of mass graves. The burnt and broken box was meant to suggest both a coffin, and a burnt-out building. You look in through the holes and come across these "dead bodies" lying in a pile. The title was If You Want to Die in Bed, Don't Care too Much for Country, I think. It's a lyric from a song from Miss Saigon, and the idea is that it's better to flee and live than fight for independence and die.

I think these next couple of piles of dolls were all called If You Want to Die in Bed... I found a box of white tiles on the street and used those underneath to attempt a cold, clinical feel.

This installation of the dolls is from the Furr exhibition. The title is Was It Worth It? It's about winning at all costs...

I called this arrangement Fall of the Rebel Angels. This was the Suspect Packages show.

This was another arrangement of Fall of the Rebel Angels. This was from my solo show Hate and Envy and Crime and Darkness and Pain at Kudos Gallery.

Luggage revisited

2009-08-29T04:48:00.000-07:00

I've written about these works before, but I found some more photos, so thought I'd revisit them. The installation shot is from the Luggage... Not Baggage show at PCL Exhibitionists in 2000.

I seemed to be a little confused about the titles when I wrote last time, but apparently this first work is called Why Prolong The Agony? I'm not sure why... It has human hair sandwiched between fly wire, so maybe I was using the idea of a cage entrapping people? I think it's a lyric from a song. This is about 20x20cm. I machine stitched the panels, then hand stitched them to form the bag. The handles are artificial hair plaits.

This work is called Just What Is It That Makes Today's Boys So Different, So Appealing? I've used the title a couple of times to suggest a paedophilic theme. They're clearly just snapshots, but by giving them a suggestive title, it forces one to reexamine the images. One becomes a voyeur, rather than just a mere observer. The photographs have been laminated into panels, then linked with key rings.

I seem to think, in the previous post, that this is called What Is It To Be Human? Initially I thought it must be the one with the hair, and I'm still not entirely sure that it's not! Then this would be Why Prolong The Agony? Not sure how that would fit either! The interior is plastic cling wrap that has been hand spun, then woven over a frame. The panels were sewn together, then covered in faux fur. This is probably the most useful of the bags, and also the least "artistic."

This last one is called What Price Love? It's made from cards that I'd received from men after I had, uh-hum, "met" them, which had their names and phone numbers. I chose only those cards which had a first name, but no last name. They were sewn between sheets of acetate. The stitching to form the bag is also machine stitching (the plastic was flexible enough to allow it to be squished through the sewing machine).

Oklahoma City National Memorial

2009-08-26T03:36:00.000-07:00

For this post I thought I'd start showing memorials that I photographed while doing research for my MFA (my thesis is here). I went from Sydney to Tokyo, to the U.S.A. and Canada, Europe and Israel, all on a three-month trip. One of my favourites was this memorial, the Oklahoma City National Memorial.

"The Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum was created to honor those who were killed, those who survived and those changed forever by the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The Memorial and Museum are dedicated to educating visitors about the impact of violence, informing about events surrounding the bombing, and inspiring hope and healing through lessons learned by those affected." My main problem with this memorial was the inclusivity expressed by the statement above, from the website. I think things have gotten out of hand when those who were "changed forever" are treated the same as those who are killed in this sort of event.

Here is some explanation of the symbolism, again from the website:

Gates of Time
These monumental twin gates frame the moment of destruction – 9:02 a.m. – and mark the formal entrances to the Memorial. The East Gate represents 9:01 a.m. on April 19, and the innocence of the city before the attack. The West Gate represents 9:03 a.m., the moment we were changed forever, and the hope that came from the horror in the moments and days following the bombing.

Reflecting Pool
The pool occupies what was once N.W. Fifth Street. Here, a shallow depth of gently flowing water helps soothe wounds, with calming sounds providing a peaceful setting for quiet thoughts. The placid surface shows the reflection of someone changed forever by their visit to the Memorial.

Field of Empty Chairs
The 168 chairs represent the lives taken on April 19, 1995. They stand in nine rows to represent each floor of the building, and each chair bears the name of someone killed on that floor. Nineteen smaller chairs stand for the children. The field is located on the footprint of the Murrah Building.

The Man Who Eats Meat Cannot Sneer at the Butcher

2009-08-09T03:06:00.000-07:00

This small (15cm high) sculpture, titled The Man Who Eats Meat Cannot Sneer at the Butcher, was from the same exhibition as the works in this post and this one. It's a figure constructed from wire and chicken bones, and covered with sewn, cooked chicken skin, which I then salted to preserve it.

I worried about storing something with chicken skin on it, even preserved as it was. Eventually I took the skin off and had it outside in a friend's garden for a year or so. The wire rusted and the chicken bones have dried out.

Let Down Your Hair

2009-08-09T03:01:00.000-07:00

This is a Rapunzel-themed work called Let Down Your Hair. I've exhibited it three times in two different versions. The first show was at COFASpace, in a show of Sculpture students' work (the photos with the wooden floor), and the same version was then shown in my Honours Year Graduation show. The long plait is made from human hair matted together then braided to create the rope hanging from the ceiling. The brown paper is hand made and has hair embedded in it. Printed onto it are versions of the Rapunzel story, or commentaries on it, or poems with a similar theme, as well as a few hair-related texts.

Here are 16 of the original 25 prints. The others didn't scan so well, what with the small printing on some of them, and the hair in the paper...

The brown paper was quite thin, which is one of the reasons why I displayed it on the ground. For a show in Melbourne at MARS Gallery I decided to reprint the text onto white paper which also had hair in it. I then had the paper on the wall so that the text could be read behind the hair plait. It's in the centre of this image, in the corner.

Evolution Hasn't Finished Yet

2009-08-09T02:57:00.000-07:00

This is one work that was exhibited with the figures I wrote about here. I have a few more works from the same show to post. I worked with the human figure, but with different materials and different sizes, and all slightly stylized rather than realistic representations. This work was called Evolution Hasn't Finished Yet. This work had its genesis in the chico baby sphere which I wrote about here. The resin started to separate from the chico babies, so I put it out in a garden (the garden of Patrick White's house, just for a bit of name dropping) to see what would happen. It was attacked by birds who ate the chico babies, but one shell was left intact, so I thought I'd coat chico babies in resin and deliberately create empty shells. The cicada shell works that also feature in the same post also had an influence with the idea of metamorphosis. I put the shells on circuit boards to suggest the influence that technology could have on our evolution.

Momentum in Canberra - Closing weekend

2009-08-01T20:19:00.000-07:00

I've just come back from Canberra where the latest leg of the Momentum: 18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial tour has just finished at the ANU School of Art Gallery. There was a diverse and well-attended symposium on the Friday, the closing night event in the evening, then on the Saturday a series of floor talks from the curator and 5 of the artists in the show. I spoke on both days, giving information about different aspects of the work that is in the show.

I took a number of snapshots of the exhibition so that a general feel for the show can be had, without trying for great shots of individual work. Most of the titles and artist details can be seen in this post. The first two photos are from the entrance, then the rest move around the gallery in no order.

Here are some photos from the closing night:

These are from the floor talks, in the order that people spoke. Vicki Mason, Jane Bowden, me, Annie Trevillian, curator Valerie Kirk talking about Louise Saxton's work, and Cecilia Heffer. Valerie Kirk spoke about the work of all the artists who weren't there.

And lastly here's a review of the show from The Canberra Times on Thursday July 30 (Times 2 section, page 8). It's the best review of the show yet, and of course by "best" I mean "talks about my work the most"!

The tour moves to Wagga next with the next show on at the Wagga Wagga Art Gallery from August 7 to September 30. See here for full tour details.

I also received some more photos from the weekend taken by Annie Trevillian:

Bruce Carnie, Annie Trevillian, me, Cecilia Heffer

It's Not You, It's Us - A Collection of Rejections

2009-07-24T01:34:00.000-07:00

I recently applied for an Australia Council New Works Grant, but was tragically rejected. I thought I'd add all the rejection letters that I've received over the years. I've written about a few before in a couple of posts. There aren't actually that many, given that the first ones are from 2001.

The one above was a rejection, but at least I got this slight boost - I was runner-up. Unfortunately the winner was able to fulfill his duties and I didn't receive the scholarship!

One-off toaster

2009-07-21T04:29:00.000-07:00

This is a work I made around 2000 for a class in electronics in art. I attached light bulbs to the bottom of the toaster (inside) and when the button was pushed down, usually turning the toaster on, the lights came on instead. I had a translucent red gel over the slots so a diffuse red glow resulted. The image of the gagged man on the side was sandblasted on. On the other side it had "STOP ME." The man is a found image which I've used a couple of other times (here and here). I've thought that if I ever got a tattoo I would use this image. I like it because it's so ambiguous - Is it someone held captive? Is it about censorship? Self-censorship?

Sculptural Figures

2009-07-21T04:20:00.001-07:00

Here are some more wire figures. It's a subject I've explored on and off over the years. I made some similar works for my first solo show (the work at the end of this post), but wanted to try some different things a few years later. The pin work below and the group of figures were included in my graduation show in 2001 at COFA. The group show was called Mint. I went to the cd-rom catalogue to check on titles and found that the format is "no longer supported" I think it said. If you're planning a catalogue for a show, DO NOT go for anything digital/electronic/web-based if you want people to be able to see it in three years time!

I remember that this work was called Comfortably Numb, after the Pink Floyd song from The Wall. It was a wire figure stuffed with cotton wool and covered in silicone sealant, which then had thousands and thousands of pins stuck into it. Unfortunately the neck disappeared with all the pins stuck in! I left this on the street when I moved out of one apartment and it was snapped up by someone. God knows what happened to it. Hmmm... I've found a hard copy of my blog from a few years back, and this title is actually Relaxed and Comfortable, but the connection to needles is the same.

I don't recall the title of this work. It was refugee/detention centre themed (this was at the height of the Howard regime's anti-refugee policies). The wire in these ones was covered in papier-mâché which was burnt and coated with a number of layers of shellac. They stood in a layer of sand. Oh, maybe it was called United We Stand? Something like that... Something to do with solidarity? No, I've found this title, too. It's actually Amicus Humani Generis. I'm not sure where I got that title from. It means "friend of the human race." I assume I was being ironic...

This is the first of this type of work that I made. It's called Schadenfreude, and I wrote about it here. I didn't include a full-length shot in that post so I'm showing it again here. It was covered with resin which made it very shiny. I wanted to avoid that in the work above, so used shellac.

Felted double-weave textiles

2009-07-08T04:12:00.000-07:00

I showed some double-weave textiles here, but thought I'd present these ones by themselves. The white is wool, and the blue is a plastic twine. It's a plain double-weave cloth which I then felted. The wool has shrunk, but not the plastic which has buckled and puckered, adding texture and a sculptural element to the weaving.

This is a shot of the weaving before felting. It was basically a flat piece of cloth.

This was another pattern from the same warp:

Momentum in Canberra plus Education Resource Kit

2009-07-01T04:20:00.000-07:00

Momentum: 18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial is making its next stop in Canberra at the ANU School of Art Gallery from July 8 to August 1. Instead of a big opening, there's going to be a closing event, to coincide with some workshops, a symposium, and artists' talks. See the details below (they all look quite faint, but click on the images to get a better view):

There's also an education resource kit available for schools to use when art students visit the Biennial. It's a PDF available online here. Unfortunately I had some trouble getting the info from pdf format to jpeg images on some of the pages. The first two pages are as they appear on the pdf, but the next page had to be converted to Word which has affected the formatting. See the original document for the better version.

The kit talks about various works in connection to themes to be explored by the students to get them to think about the art, and to give them ideas for their own art. This is the section on my art (not in the original formatting):

Exploring connections

Hair is the unusual weft material in Rodney Love’s Six Degrees, a set of framed weavings with stencilled lettering of the names of each hair donor. In a frame there is a collection of people’s hair woven in sections butted against each other in one continuous strip. This suggests the closeness of groupings in our society and the way that people are linked through being part of a group. The stencilled name and the hair colours define the individuals. The works have no obvious beginning or end so represent a selection of groups that could extend beyond the limit of the number in this series.

Writing about his work Six Degrees, artist Rodney Love says:
“The work is concerned with what it means to be an individual within a group. Imagine this work extending beyond its boundaries to encompass everyone in the world. And imagine the population of the world as it inexo¬rably becomes larger and larger. We, as a species, may reach a tipping point where the planet can no longer sustain us. Then, whether you are concerned with individuality or collectivity, we will all share the same fate.”

What do you think about Rodney’s description of the connections between human beings and the way that he has illustrated it?

How would you create an artwork that explores the idea of ‘connections?

Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award Exhibition

2009-06-30T03:07:00.000-07:00

I've got more information about the Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award exhibition. All the photos here have been generously provided by Louise Saxton whose Home-tree is the work on the left above. Firstly, here's a list of all the finalists in the show:

Soraya Abidin, Sally Blake, Jayne Branchflower, Annabelle Collett, Cresside Collette, Sue Ferrari, Dianne Firth, Melanie Fitzmaurice, Pamela Fitzsimons, Saffron Lily Gordon, Hilary Green, Tim Gresham, Mandy Gunn, Cecilia Heffer, Abigail Howells, Peta Jones, Adrienne Kneebone, Anita Larkin, Kay Lawrence, Sara Lindsay, Rodney Love, Barbara Macey, Penny Malone, Susan Mathews, Julie Montgarrett, Sabine Parge, Jennifer Robertson, Julie Ryder, Louise Saxton, Demelza Sherwood, Patrick Snelling, Emma Sulzer, Libby Van Schaick, Sera Waters, Ilka White, and Louiseann Zahra-King

As I wrote here, Mandy Gunn was the winner of this inaugural award. Here's her work Fire Sticks from the Burn Out series.

This is the entrance to the show, with Sea life wall pod installation by Penny Malone, and Sara Lindsay's Parampara #2.

This shot has my work Six Degrees: Vida Gaigalas to Bob Hunt on the right, Melanie Fitzmaurice's Explorer's Rope in the middle, and Pamela Fitzsimons' Skin/eucalyptus on the left. I think the work on the floor is Louiseann Zahra-King's A bird readies the soul and moves it to tenderness.

Emma Sulzer's Puma cat (with two other works) is in the foreground, the hanging work is Sue Ferrari's Common Threads, and the wall on the left has Cresside Collette's Two Lands Suite, I think.

From left to right: Julie Ryder's Variations I (Leaves), Cecilia Heffer's Reticella Lace, I think Hilary Green's Tracking South, Annabelle Collett's Swatches - Merge & Filter, and Soraya Abidin's Love Fruit on the plinth.

I think this is Kay Lawrence's This is rain.

This is Anita Larkin's Speak to me of things unknown, and maybe Tim Gresham's Liquid Module IV.

Pretty by Demelza Sherwood:

The work on the left may be Julie Montgarrett's Expository Angel, and RED Stones #1 by Dianne Firth is on the right.

Here are some pages from the catalogue:

Here's an article I found online and linked to from my previous post, but it then disappeared. Fortunately I'd printed it out, and here it is. It's from the Wangaratta Chronicle.

Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award Winner

2009-06-24T16:53:00.001-07:00

This is just a brief post to record the winner of the Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award. Apparently, informed sources tell me, Mandy Gunn is the deserved winner for her piece Fire Sticks. Mandy is also a fellow Tamworth Textile Biennial artist. These are the only details I've got so far, but I'll post more info as soon as I get it! Below are some images provided by Louise Saxton, whose work also appears on the cover of the invitation shown in the link above. Congratulations to Mandy, and all the other artists in what is by a number of accounts a great show. I've also found an article announcing the winner here, and which, as an added bonus, mentions my work. (It seems to have moved and I can't find it, but I have an image of it in my next post.)

Object magazine, Momentum review

2009-06-22T03:48:00.000-07:00

Object magazine has published a review of Momentum, the 18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial 2008, written by the brilliant Belinda von Mengersen. (See here for other Momentum blog posts) Object 58, May 2009

Drawing pin shoe sculptures

2009-06-20T19:40:00.000-07:00

This post shows a pair of shoe sculptures that I made in the late 90s, and which I first showed in the Touch show at PCL Exhibitionists in 1999. It was a pair of shoes painted gold and covered with drawing pins, then covered in polyester resin. The first shoe is pristine, with the pins shining gold, neat and clean. The title is Whoever Fits This Shoe Will Be My Bride, an obvious reference to Cinderella, but with the suggestion of darkness behind the perfect marriage.

The other shoe is battered and rusted, some pins have fallen off. The title is Happily Ever After, adding to the idea that marriage is not all it's made out to be.

Memento Vivere

2009-06-20T19:30:00.000-07:00

This post features hand-made paper works I made when I was Artist-In-Residence at the UNSW Union from February to May 2002. My proposal was to make these paper works as well as giving a papermaking workshop during the residency. All the paper was made with hair in it. The main project, Memento Vivere (the opposite of memento mori - I may have coined this term myself... Also the name of the exhibition which ran from April 26 to May 3), had hair from one individual in each sheet. It is difficult to photograph as all the sheets are white or cream with bits of hair the only imagery. Each 16x16cm sheet is a portrait of the person who has donated that hair. The first two images are close-up shots of the installation, and the third is all 90 of the sheets in this installation (later in the year I exhibited it with 162? sheets). This was the first project where the emphasis was placed on the individuals who hair is displayed. Before this, the hair acted as a metaphor for groups of anonymous people (see these sculptures, for example), and would later become groups of joined individuals in my hair weavings (here, for example). The list of all the people who donated hair is in the catalogue at the end of this post. They number 109 in the catalogue, there are 110 bags of hair below, but only 90 sheets of paper. I assume this was a matter of timing - I didn't receive the hair donations in time to make paper for this show, but they were included in my Honours graduation show at the end of the year.

This was the hair I used to make the above series. I originally asked for passport-sized photographs as well as hair, but received so few that I didn't end up using them, except for the series with my own images below.

The following series, Rodney über Alles, has only my hair in the sheets of paper, and with photobooth photos of me printed on them. At the opening, someone asked me if the people were all in the same family...

The following series is one that I've written about before but thought I'd revisit the whole series, given that I started all these projects at the same time. I realized that the image below was not from the MARS Gallery show as I wrote, but from the exhibition of new works that I made for my residency at the Union. The series is called Long, straight, curly, fuzzy, snaggy, shaggy, ratty, matty, oily, greasy, fleecy, shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen, knotted, polka-dotted, twisted, beaded, braided, powdered, flowered and confettied, bangled, tangled, spangled and spaghettied. It's a collection of hair-related texts and images, from science, fairy tales, religion, fashion, history, etc. Go to the link at the beginning of this paragraph to see details of individual works.

This series, Una Nox Dormienda, used left-over paper from the above 3 series. I buried sheets in the garden, so they're stained from soil. Rather unexpectedly - because I hadn't even thought about it - worms ate chunks from the paper which added to the appearance of age, and suggests the passage of time. I've added text from The Book of Revelations to add a religious dimension. The title comes from Catallus' "nox est perpetua una dormienda" (night stretches forth in one long sleep) - when we die we sleep, with no idea of an afterlife. I've compared this with the Christian idea of a life after death, but the state of the paper parallels what will really happen to us - eaten by worms, and decaying in the earth.

At the end of the residency was an exhibition of the work I had created during that time (plus an exhibition half way through the residency which featured earlier works - a mini-retrospective!). This was the invitation to the final show:

And this was the catalogue:

A COFA Art History and Theory student, Jennifer Hamilton, wrote a review of the exhibition for Artwrite, an online journal produced by COFA students. I can no longer find it online, but this is a copy of the printed article:

Aluminium foil sculptures

2009-06-20T19:27:00.000-07:00

This post just has two random sculptures made from aluminium foil twisted into rope, I guess you could say, and then manipulated into larger forms. the first work is called Silver Circus, if I recall. There's a small wire box inside the mass of foil which the foil ropes snake in and out of. I think the whole thing was covered with resin and spray painted silver. It was already silver, but I think I wanted it even more silver!

This work has no title and was never exhibited. It was just an experiment with the foil "yarn." I guess it's a kind of basket, if you stretch that definition a bit.

Plastic cling wrap textiles

2009-06-20T19:20:00.000-07:00

This post shows some textile works that I made from plastic cling wrap. The first three small works are offcuts from a large box-shaped work which was twisted cling wrap woven over a wooden frame. I cut that work up and stretched sections over wooden panels to make these works.

These works were woven on a loom, just a plain weave with the twisted cling wrap. This is about 15cm wide, and the second work is about 30cm (with a close-up shot after that).

I don't think I've ever exhibited any of these works, nor do they have titles. I showed another plastic wrap work here.

Maquette for P-Flag Monument

2009-06-20T19:08:00.000-07:00

This work was a Duchampian readymade with the title Maquette for PFlag Monument, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Gay Son. Does it need any further explanation? I should have entered it in the Blake Prize.

More chopstick works

2009-06-20T05:43:00.000-07:00

This post has some more random chopstick works. I think this is the last of them. I haven't made any for a couple of years now, but it's always possible I'll decide to make some more at some point in the future. I like to go back and revisit materials or techniques, then leave them alone for awhile. These works all fall into the Everything Ends series. It was a meditation on change and finiteness, as well as looking at architecture as inspiration. These first 3 cubes are about 20cm per side. The middle boxes are about 50x50x20cm, and the 3 flat works are 50x50cm. The last work is 20x20cm.