The perspex and mixed media works by Rebecca Pearson remind me of religious icons, taking family and friends memories and transporting them to iconic level, creating different levels with different media is very affective for they are glorious. Each one packed tightly up and should be placed on a pedestal. And I love the Votives, like gargoyles on guard!!!
My video doesn’t do them justice...
In room 2, a selection of large photographs, by Sally Bongers, inkjet prints on archival paper of open spaces, a section of turf, a red carpet event, fallen blossoms, wedding confetti. Small observations that are transformed into large works and asking the audience to open there eyes as we go through life or we may miss something of value...
Is Brett East trying to trick us up and make us think that his photographs are actually photographs of his paintings, I’m just a little confused but at the same time overwhelmed by his technique. ‘Seeking to gain access to an immaterial reality beyond the limits of human vision’, oil on linen, is immensely breathtaking and gobb smackingly gorgeous!!!
Paint is a luscious substance especially for us painters, watching it while squeezing it out of the tube is almost like watching a kid in a candy store, preparing your palette is precious and ceremonial and sometimes can cause anxiety. ‘Monochrome Study 1’, oil on linen, this tiny painting is a testament to Brett’s long time affection for paint...
Car vs Art, I really loved ‘Box of Birds’, Marley’s 2009 show and I am so happy he hasn’t let me down with this show ‘Heavy Industry/Light Commercial’... I’m not a driver, but I do like cars and strangely the smell of new tyre's and of course I had a sniff of 1 of them. How could I not, standing in front of 4 shiny new commercial tyre’s, watching the different tread patterns slowly rotate. Some how I think that if there was no movement in the work, no motorized component it wouldn’t work, and all I can think of is sticking my head out the window and letting the wind blow in my face while watching a blurry landscape pass me by...
Missed her last show due to illness, so thankfully I was upright for this 1. Del’s work is intense, a visual explosion of immense proportions and made me think she may have been channeling Lady Ga Ga .. I was moved by the 11 framed works on paper, found them to be quieter than the larger works and definitely more sensitive and her technique has increased to a fury that it’s mind boggling as to how much time Del spends on 1 work...
Melanie, has given me a wonderful opportunity to really really look long and hard at this work and say what I really want to say, no holds bar, I love what she does, her interpretation, the feeling behind each piece and my interpretation of what I am looking at.
I’m not going to pin point a specific work and say what it is and how its made, I’m just going to say what I feel about it or as a group.. or how each work fits into the group, worse case scenario I could get this all wrong.
“untitled: 16/49. process of selection”, is a large collection of work made over a 9 year period, Melanie and the Directors of Index have laid out the work throughout the gallery’s vastness. The interpretation is a little more intense then just hanging a show, it’s almost as if the public is welcome to watch the process of actually hanging a show, like it’s a performance but at the same time it’s not.
But Melanie is open to suggestion, unlike a lot of Artist’s, this whole show is all about allowing suggestion, inviting constructive criticism, and engaging in conversation. It’s refreshing to talk to artists who don’t get all antsy and over protective with their work. As an Artist you really don’t have the right to get all defensive if you don’t like what somebody has said about your work. You make work and you put it out there and of course people are going to say stuff. Learn to accept it or don’t do the work.
Back to the work in question...
In the front room there is a large floor work of coloured squares of board. If you stand in a way as to not being able to see the supports, these squares and the low hanging light which is offering up a larger shadow suggest that this is a floating work, simple in it’s application but very affective. I pass a main wall with a spattering of cut and stitched paper, now I see these pieces are of manipulation and of slight perspective, using more than 1 colour and laying the work, stitching them together and letting the stitches stand out in there neat order. They are a delight to look at, I really just wanted to look over them with a magnified glass as there is an enormous amount of attention to detail in these works.
I was not able to pass the 9 green panels mounted on nails, I stood and stared at it and discussed it at length with myself the different hues of green or was there just 1. Was the light playing tricks with my eyes. The work next to it offered up slits of background colour like cuts to the skin. The soft yellow and blue work is the oldest piece in the entire show and Melanie’s favourite, could be mine too, it’s wistful and hangs quietly and it’s very contemplative. I like how it’s hiding it’s hanging threads.
On the opposite wall there is 5 floor works leaning up against the wall, they have little sections cut out and filled with woven thread, these are my second favourite as they jog my memory of learning how to weave and remembering the fine work of string art.
And the stand out yellow work, was it deliberately placed over the hidden door, was it reflecting the hidden door or was it just pretending to be the door.
It’s not just paper Melanie uses, there is wood, mud, vinyl, thread, paint, nails and the list goes on and on. This show is more of an symposium of colour, colour to entice, seduce, reflect upon and to remember...
Isabel Gomez, ‘Old Land’, oil on canvas, I’m speechless it’s so beautiful...
Mark Hetherington’s ‘I made this sculpture for you’, oil on canvas, when someone says this we always assume someone has done something bad and now wants to be forgiven in a small unobtrusive way. And ‘Urn on a log in Space’, oil on canvas, of course it was what was I thinking!!!
Tanya Sparke, ‘Regent Bower Bird’, oil paint on found wooden rulers, this is a true delight...
Waiting for the Fall - Angela Lane
Mesmerizing, exquisite, sumptuous and to die for, these tiny paintings will take your breath away. I first saw them 2 weeks before the opening and just couldn’t get them out of my mind, went to the gallery website and reserved 1 and have now committed myself to paying it off. They are the most beautiful paintings I have seen in a long time, and I had a chance to meet Angela at the opening, although there was a queue of admirers waiting to meet her, got a chance to talk to her briefly and found that she was just as lovely as her work.
To some her subject matter can seem a little too full of doom and gloom, but remember we are looking at her representation of future landscapes painted in the old traditional way of the Dutch painters. Heavy in detail ‘From something to nothing’, oil on found board, it’s colours suggest a ravaged landscape. ‘From Whence The Smoke Came’, oil on found board, this is the 1 that captured my heart, I swear Angela must have been channeling Turner and being painted on an old bread board gives it that extra bit of passion...
Written by Fleur
12th July - 30th July 2011
www.damienmintongallery.com.au
So far this year has been all about ‘Abstraction’, show after show, each artist with their own perception and technique... So I couldn’t really not let this show by Western Australian artist Ron Nyisztor pass me by...
I was a little curious as to what ‘Wikipedia’ says about ‘Abstraction’ and saw the funny side when it clearly stated in brackets (“real” or “concrete”) and there are paintings of concrete blocks in this show, but it can only be funny for a moment as these paintings are quite serious.. And seriously beautiful!!!
Standing back I looked long and hard at each of these works, letting the distance between me and them settle quietly and comfortably. Studying the effect of his painting, how some of the objects look like they are just floating in thin space above a glass like surface giving the subjects an ethereal presence... I guess when you paint a picture of an object ‘as an Abstractionist’ you paint it in a different light by creating a different mood, giving a ‘banal’ object a new life so to speak... Helping us or making us really understand the object as it is and not what it’s for...
It was great to have a catch up with John McPhee who opened the show, we’d not seen each other since the early 90’s.
And I’m sorry I couldn’t get this post up sooner.. guess I have been a little overwhelmed by so much beautiful Art...
James Jones - Moments, if your looking for God you wont find him here, this body of work is about the universe and James has had a fascination with ‘space’ for some time and
most of us may need that Paul Davies handbook to explain some of the titles in this show...
Repetitive brush strokes like following the sequence to the space time continuum. Burnt orange after glow, I’d like to think he’s paying homage to the end of the Shuttle program with ‘Anthem Light’, oil on canvas, others have said completely different things like the head of Jimi Hendrix or James soaking his feet in a bucket...
That’s what I like about abstraction, it makes us think about what we are looking at...
A universe forever changing, a ‘pink hole’ as opposed to a ‘black hole’, ‘Gap Analysis’, oil on canvas, helping us change the way we have really thought about what the real colour of the inside of our universe is, this painting is my favourite with it’s strength and intensity in colour...
‘Horizon Gravity’, oil on canvas, gravity itself is a funny thing, some stars that are so compact have collapsed under intense gravity and feathers fall slowly in low gravity, somehow I wouldn’t like to be stuck in between... And again someone said this painting looks like a crystal challis glistening in the sunlight...
I’ve always believed in the ‘big bang’ and everything I have learnt about science I learned from Star Trek, Paul Davies and Richard Feynman... and a bit from James Jones...
John Bokor - Black Diamond District, we’ve landed on earth, a lolly lime green grassed earth with trees and streets and lots of cars...
His previous show was of interiors and in this one he’s stepped outside into the warm sunlight. ‘Beach Front’, oil on board, reminds me of my home town, with it’s small streets and lots of green lawns surrounded by a rugged mountain range. And ‘Horses’, oil on board, just a stones throw from the highway, showing us a lush green pasture and healthy trees and horses under a brilliant sun...
Balanced off nicely with a couple of ocean paintings in ‘South’ and ‘Afternoon Pool’, both oil on board, sitting by the pool gazing out to the horizon...
After abstaining for 9 days I was a little surprised with the wonderful choices of reds being on offer at the opening, so just couldn’t resist. Had only 1 glass but it was delicious and yes Douglas was allowed out from behind the bar this evening to enjoy his solo with glass in hand and wearing yet another lovely smoking jacket...
Some of us would be mistaken to say this show was just another photography show, ok they are photographs but ones not taken with a standard camera. Douglas has put to use the 2 meg camera in his Nokia N70 mobile phone and has created non manipulated ‘beautiful’ photographs...
‘What The!! I said to myself when I found out what he had used, OMD they really are very beautiful works, so lovely I bought 1...
Destiny Deacon - Pose-a-Rama, I really love what Destiny does and how she pulls together her images and story lines...
Using a Humorous take on fictional events giving us all a bit of a giggle in the process with these beautiful big blown up blurry photographs. Sumptuous sets and colours and Blakula (Dracula) looking like he should really look like instead of that pasty white skinned freak we are all so use to...
Looking forward to her next instalment...
Linda Marrinon - Figure Sculpture, all of these works have the same angelic androgynous face but in different clothing. Are they telling us a story from history, I think so...
Out of all of them my favourite is the ‘Green Golfer’, tinted plaster, bronze, I don’t know why maybe because it’s the only one of the series that is doing an action... With sculpture I always want to touch the work but there was too many people watching for me to do so on the night.. Maybe next time...
