Acknowledgements Greg Fullerton would like to thank Merric Brettle,Ted Fullerton, Tiffany Parbs, and the staff of the School of Art Galleries. Michael Graeve would like to thank Place Gallery, Richmond. Drew Pettifer would like to thank Benjamin Creek, Marcin Wojcik, Geoffrey O’Connor, Matthew Blair, Jared Davis, Daniel Palmer, Meyers Place Bar, Mance Design, Justin O’Connor, Warwick Baker and Tony Garifalakis. Kit Webster would like to thank David Webster, Dan Ditmann (Tec Art) and Jeremy Kumin (Enttec). Andrew Tetzlaff would like to thank Stephen Gallagher, Kimberley Tiong, Adriane Hayward, Amanda Airs, Dylan Hammond, Ceri Hann and all of the artists involved in this exhibition for their support, assistance and contribution.
PROJECT SPACE Fourtrack GREG FULLERTON MICHAEL GRAEVE DREW PETTIFER KIT WEBSTER
PROJECT SPACE
Supported by
Curated by ANDREW TETZLAFF
BUILDING 94: 23-27 CARDIGAN STREET, CARLTON
Managed by the RMIT School of Art COORDINATOR Stephen Gallagher ADMINISTRATOR Andrew Tetzlaff INTERNS Amanda Airs & Adriane Hayward GRAPHIC DESIGN Gracia Haby & Louise Jennison EMAIL schoolofartgalleries@rmit.edu.au WEB www.schoolofartgalleries.dsc.rmit.edu.au TELEPHONE +61 3 9925 4971 GALLERY OPENING HOURS Monday – Friday 10.00am to 5.00pm
WEDNESDAY 11 APRIL TO THURSDAY 3 MAY 2012 OPENING THURSDAY 5 APRIL 5-7PM FLOOR TALK THURSDAY 19 APRIL 1-1.30PM
Fourtrack investigates artwork that proposes trajectories, connections and crossed wires between sound and visual art. Perhaps then it is counter-intuitive to include work that does not produce any sound whatsoever. Greg Fullerton’s abstracted speaker boxes are sculptures fashioned from plywood and plastic funnels. Though silent, the physical objects themselves have a subtle complexity – as if a megaphone or loud speaker has been equipped with the aesthetic principles of Russian Suprematism, the ridiculousness of Dada, and the readymades of Anti-Art. Despite appearances and our best efforts though, the work remains noticeably quiet Their forms contain a potential for a vocalized sound but, due to the sculpture’s tragic impotence in this regard, this is a potential that will never be realized, only anticipated or inferred. From this koan – this contradiction of form and function – comes the possibilities of amplified silence, of non-sound, of physically manifest quiet, and of mentally constructed noise.
Greg Fullerton Studio image of Wall without Sound, 2011/12 Plywood, found objects, plastic
Almost as silent as Fullerton’s boxes is the work of Drew Pettifer. A sculpture extends off the wall like some sort of an architectural erection or proboscis and throbs with life reminiscent of Rafael Lozano-Hemmer’s pulse works. Though the work is essentially comprised of sound – is indeed a translation of a sound recording into light – the only audible vestige left in it is the mechanical whizzing of a motor. The unheard score to which the light pulses is a man masturbating to climax. This erogenous, personal, and intimate act is made public, though its translation both restrains its sexuality and hides (or denies) the identity of the subject. We are not privy to the source material, only to a discreet glow of the Post-Minimalist sculpture. Pettifer’s work often deals in this
sort of modest or clinical dissection of energy – the balancing act of successfully distilling a material to its quintessence – the transference of it, and the sometimes-difficult reconciliation between the original form and the new. The paintings of Michael Graeve also explore the translation of sound but, unlike Pettifer, do so in an exposed manner. Graeve’s multi-channel sound compositions are used as scores for a series of abstract paintings, and the two are presented side-by-side such that fragments of sound and colour align with one other. Experientially the work can be read as a whole or as a collection of composite parts – as a forced synesthetic moment or a kind of visual repetition of the sonic experience. As we attempt to decode the tangle of connections the work takes on another level of complexity: we are able to separate and compare the variety of artistic languages employed, consider the artist’s choices and interpretation, and notice the structural influence of both of these decisions. While picking apart these nested relationships and categorically deciphering Graeve’s code is tempting, it is not entirely necessary. His nuanced exploration into language and transcription is evident regardless of whether we solve the puzzle, and it is this investigation itself that, like Hindemith’s musical distillation of mathematics and Schoenberg’s twelvetone systems, enables the work to exceed the sum of its parts.
as if it were a Claude glass1 played out in reverse, projecting light as a drawing medium instead of capturing it as a drawing tool. Similar to the glass, this modern equipment is used to create a representational drawing of the gallery space; however in this instance the drawing is continuously generating (like a performance or animation), done on a 1:1 scale (like a rubbing), marked directly onto the space itself (like an installation), and led by a minimal sound composition (like a dance). Indeed Webster’s audible composition is an impetus for and co-producer of this drawing. The light and sound play is so tightly bound together that the lines of creative authority between them are blurred. While one moment sound seems to inspire a visual counterpoint, the next it is inspired by it. As stated in the beginning this exhibition is an investigation, an experiment into the convergence of sound and visual art. The works in it both silently and audibly consider the potentiality of this combination and propose, amongst other things, a new way of listening. Andrew Tetzlaff is a Melbourne-based artist and curator. 1. A Claude glass is a small darkly-tinted convex mirror used as a viewing glass and drawing tool in the 17th and 18th century by artists, travellers and connoisseurs of landscape painting. (“Drawing techniques: the Claude Glass”. Victoria and Albert Museum. Web. 13 Mar. 2012. http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/d/
Meanwhile, Kit Webster’s Scribbluminous is less a transference of sound and more a visual articulation of it. The gallery’s architectural surface is digitally mapped, and Webster uses video projection and motorized mirrors to trace choreographed light across the fixtures, walls and ceiling. The technology functions
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Right Drew Pettifer Sound-to-light hardware for Untitled (Lamp), 2012 Reverse, Left to Right Michael Graeve Subsequent Moments Simultaneously, Front, A, 2011 Subsequent Moments Simultaneously, Front, B, 2011 Subsequent Moments Simultaneously, Audibly, 2011 Subsequent Moments Simultaneously, Side, A, B, C, D, 2011 Installation of oil on linen and 4-channel sound composition Kit Webster Scribbliminous (still), 2009 Digital-video Installation