Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Another Silk Road

Referencing the trade routes between Asia, the Mediterranean and Europe this exhibition of 9 artists shows works embodying highly varied cultural exchange. All the artists have a connection to China and all their work is based on ceramic production, but contrast through personal experience, two-way exchange and reflection of relationships and the impact of technologies.

In fact this exhibition is not just about ceramics. There are large scale photographic backdrops, a video projection, a looped slideshow and a documentary which help flesh out some of the artists ideas about ceramics, tradition, production and cultural reflections.

It was a pretty straight forward exhibition where the contemporary art space allowed the objects to ‘speak’ in their own terms within the minimalist ‘white cube’. Although there wasn’t much interpretation as far as the labels went, (just the regular data-style art gallery label) I didn’t mind this because a room brochure was at hand for detailed, more narrative information.

There were two standout highlights to the show, Julie Bartholomew’s installation of objects comprising Vuitton Dynasty, 2008 and Qing Prada, 2008 and Douglas Cham’s Banana-kids series, 2008-9. Bartholomew makes a bold statement about global brands competing with traditional cultural forms. Her beautiful replica ‘objects des arts’ delicately express ideas about cultural integration and changing globalized ideals usurping themselves within the modern China.

Douglas Cham’s polished earthenware on the other hand, packs more of a political punch and reflects on his personal experience of displacement as a Chinese male in Australia. The title Banana-kids, is drawn from the term used by immigrant Chinese about first generation children, inferring “yellow on the outside, but white on the inside”. The assemblages of half peeled bananas revealing colloquial motifs such as a crocodile holding a tinny (beer can), are meticulously produced with bright glossy glazed skin and the soft white creamy texture of the unglazed creatures within. They are beautifully rendered pieces which make you want to move right up close to view them. Upon doing so, you are confronted with a subtle sourness in the detail, such as the red inked banana brand stamp on the each skin showing the date 1901-1973, the lengthy period of the White Australia Policy. Among the 8 or so banana skins, Cham also displays an audio visual in which immigrants are interviewed and set the task of hailing a taxi in Sydney city. It is an experiment that, not so subtly, explores racism in Australia. Through his ceramics, Cham isn’t just reflecting his personal immigrant experience and the tension between traditional and Western culture, he also looks at his standing in a broader, collective, Australian position on cultural relations, to expose some interesting tensions.


Ivan Dougherty Gallery
2 – 25 July 2009
Free entry
Monday – Saturday 10am – 5pm
Closed Sundays and public holidays

College of Fine Arts
Selwyn Street
Paddington NSW 2021

http://www.cofa.unsw.edu.au/galleries/idg/

Friday, July 17, 2009

Intensely Dutch: Image, Abstraction and the Word

I wasn’t sure what to really expect from this show at first... For some reason, I hadn’t followed any of the publicity, but, I did anticipate something slightly different to the generalist ‘masters’ shows the Art Gallery so often pushes on to the public. I’m glad my suspicions were correct. I couldn’t help a huge sigh at the entry as I peered through to the first room filled with abstract expressionism. There’s nothing like a really thick, roughly gestured, slab, of paint smeared over a canvas to get my blood pumping! (Well...maybe that’s just me)

Vigorously animated, child-like and primitive, the selection of canvases, portfolios and lithographs exemplify the vitality of the modernist Dutch painters joined in expressing a new optimism post WWII. Early works by the artists of the CoBrA movement, such as Karel Appel, Jaap Nanninga and Constant are bright and energetic, but amongst all the rough edges and flurry of brush marks, the subjects depict innocence and sincerity. My favourite painting, Animal Tamer, 1984 by Lucebert was a beautiful mix of an untidy and grotesque assemblage of teeth and eyes, together with playful and endearing expressions. Most of the works of the 1970s-80s were abstracted and restrained landscapes, but were still truly expressionistic with the heavy impasto finishing. From the instantly recognisable Wilem De Kooning to artists such as Jaap Wagemaker, Bram Bogart and Jan Shoonhoven the exhibition shows the continued style and gusto of the movement through their geometric and sculptural approach to building up the surface of the canvas. Even in the uber-abstracted styles their works are just as emotional and sensual as their CoBrA predecessors.

If you’re into a liberal use of paint like I am, you should enjoy the overall visceral ‘messiness’ of this genre of painting and be prepare to have your emotions stirred. The curator, Hendrik Kolenberg, has cleverly compiled this retrospective of painting and poetry with honesty and wit; successfully revealing some eccentric and surprising elements you’d expect from the Dutch.

Art Gallery of New South Wales
5 June - 23 August 2009
Open every day, 10am - 5pm
Free admission, special exhibition fees apply

Art Gallery Road,
The Domain Sydney NSW 2000,
http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

FINK - Fostering Design

A retrospective of the entire FINK + Co range is impressive to see in one space. Robert Foster has certainly proven a track record of unique and enduring product design over the past fifteen years. This exhibition of Foster's production range showcases not only his individual designs but the continued collaboration with other leading Australian designer-makers. From Fosters iconic spun, pressed and anodised aluminium beakers and tray, 2005, and Rohan Nichol's jig-formed and hand anodised bracelet, 1998, to Remi Verchot's ply-laminate, hand-turned, wooden bowl 2002, it's hard not to recognise a huge range of talent in one room.

A highlight for me was the wine chiller by Bronwyn Riddiford which is a clever laser-cut pressed anodised aluminium vessel incorporating a rotation moulded, plastic chiller insert that very subtly emits the dayglo hues from within. With the suped-up colour scheme and the sumptuous velveteen finishing of the sandblasted anodised surface, these meticuluously resolved pieces certainly look right at home in the gallery setting. Dare I say, they're almost too sexy to be utilitarian pieces for the home.

Object: Australian Centre for Craft and Design
26 June - 30 August 2009
Tuesday - Sunday, 11am-6pm
Free admission

417 Bourke Street
Surry Hills, NSW, 2010
www.object.com.au



Friday, July 3, 2009

Khaled Sabsabi - Integration, assimilation and a fair go for all

After migrating to Australia from Lebanon in the 1970s, Khaled Sabsabi has worked in music production, audio-visual design and the visual arts for the past 16 years. This exhibition incorporates three video installations over both floors of Gallery 4A.

Australians, 2006/2009, on the ground floor is multi-channel video installation and is viewable 24 hours a day through the street window. The pastiche of interchanging face parts: eyes; noses; mouths, meticulously oscillates over 12 monitors to show bold portraits of multiplicity and multiculturalism.

On the upper level industrial clanging and mysterious sounds permeate and draw you in to the installation. At first the shards of stringy-bark strewn as a landscape prevented me from getting close to view the main wall. The half light created by the red projection of a small pool or well in a cycle of spilling and filling in the centre of the floor also made it difficult to navigate the installation. After a few moments with eyes adjusting to the landscape, the oversized black lettering on the 8 metre black walls, Fuck off We’re Full hit me with confronting brevity.

I love the way Sabsabi says so much about contact, traditional ownership, migration, occupation, policy and politics in this single work.

The third installation continues to bridge the creative and the political by reconfiguring another landscape. Left-Centre-Right presents footage taken of a thunder storm over Newcastle in 2007, where the lightning is abstracted and fragmented to extent you are left wondering whether the phenomena is in fact footage from a man-made warzone rather than nature unleashed.

I left the exhibition pondering the title as much of a question as a statement.

Gallery 4A – Asia-Australia Arts Centre
13 June – 25 July 2009
Tuesday – Saturday 11am-6pm

181-187 Hay Street
Sydney NSW 2000
www.4a.com.au