the
project 8 Geraldton artists in 3 exhibitions Nov 2008 - Jan 2010
trans - act/format - ion (Faith) — Chris Bolton, 2009
The GPS project
contents
intro 1 • the love survey 2 • guess who’s coming to dinner? 6 • trans-format/act-ion 10 • artists 14 • acknowledgments 16
began in late 2008, developing from a discussion with Geraldton artists and curators seeking ways to expand and develop arts practice in the region. The initial name, the Geraldton Progressive Society was an arty in-joke that wore thin, but GPS stayed because it worked on other levels. Everyone loves an acronym and global positioning is the cause you have to have when you are a regional artist. The old sore about being on the periphery to the imagined centre and the subsequent struggle for resources and opportunities is, however, vigorously salved by the ideas, enthusiasm and determination of the participants in this project, and their creations - three ambitious exhibitions held at the Geraldton Greenough Regional Gallery from September 2009 to January 2010. The brief was to throw different artists together - for fun, for inspiration, for cross media work, to help everyone develop their conceptual, technical and organisational skills, and to challenge themselves beyond their solo studio work. Just as importantly, the project was conceived to offer the audience an innovative experience.
installation performance: The Love Survey, 2009
As with all art projects, the tangible outcome is the exhibited work. Less easy to convey is the outcome for the audience, who rose magnificently to the challenges thrown to them by unconventional presentations — an exhibition that started with nothing on the walls and ended with a banquet (see pages 6 to 9), an installation of the usually private stories and words from love letters submitted by the community (pages 2 to 5) and one that required tracing the influences of ideas through the work of four different hands (pages 10 to 13). Additionally, the relationships forged between emerging artists, seasoned practitioners, traditional and experimental makers during the course of GPS are still developing in ways that would have seemed if not impossible, then at least unlikely, before the project began. The three shows were essentially a gift to the community from the artists. This is where the ‘vibrant’ arts community (that entity so beloved of governments and bureaucrats) really begins and ends — in the hands of our artists. These makers are the hardy crew who choose to use their resources to buy materials, to pay for studios and exhibitions costs to buy the time to exercise their passion for making art. From the first group meeting it was clear the artwork created would be the kind that doesn’t generate sales, and we applied for funding from a couple of sources. We were fortunate to obtain support from the Council of Geraldton Greenough to pay for this publication, but failed on the larger bid to pay the artists, and indeed ourselves. A project such as GPS can only be realised within a supportive community and we are sincerely grateful for the generosity of the people of Geraldton-Greenough and our Council and Regional Gallery. Amanda Rowland and Robyn Walton Curators
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24 September to 25 October 2009 The ‘The Love Survey’ was inspired by The Love Letter, an intimate painting by Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer. In this 1667 painting, a woman is handed a letter which, though uunopened, is tantalisingly apparent as being from a lover. Artists Gera Woltjer and Gabrielle Woodhams researched the history of the love letter in art, literature and film and the idea of a love letter survey was conceived. The artists were keen to focus on the community’s stories, asking locals to be brave and reveal their tales of love correspondence sent and received by responding to the survey questions and ‘posting’ them in handmade letterboxes placed around town. The stories revealed were rich and sometimes surprising — variously funny, poignant, romantic or tragic — providing the artists with an imaginative foundation from which to develop works of performance, video, and installation. Text and textiles were at the heart of the process. Both artists share a joy in fabric and are skilled textile workers, with individual practices including Woodham’s expertise in printmaking and Woltjer’s performative and painting background. In this collaboration they demonstrated their strengths in these mainstay skills at the same time experimenting with media new to both. Climbing the stairs to the exhibition, visitors stepped over a coloured wire tracery of love words on the step risers, intriguing for the missing meanings embedded in the fragmented text. Once in the upstairs space, people could meander throough the key stories and love objects from the survey in an installation of hand-made, hand-printed envelopes entirely covering one main wall. Central to the display was a dreamy and beautiful video of a woman wearing a dress created by the artists, writing words of love to a soundtrack of text read from the surveys. On opening night a live performance played against the delicate hues of the video. A woman and man sat facing away from each other enacting both sides of a love story; the woman writing /sending, the man reading/receiving. The ongoing exhibition included the dress, featuring a petticoat made from the returned paper surveys themselves displayed on a headless shop dummy, curiously silent in the space despite the trailing words of love splayed out from the hem. The artists’ extended engagement with the irresistible and ubiquitous form of the love letter in this first GPS exhibition provoked that eternal curiosity most hold about relationships of all kinds, allowing us to find a little romance in the exchange.
The first night I slept at his place I woke up I was called down by him for breakfast and found a little love note on every flight of the stairs . . . Sit down . . . And think about it . . . Think about it well. Then walk up to the attic READ!!!! Come back to me and tell me . . . I love you forever R. PS: please dont forget to put on the light . . . So I did... I walked to the attic, and there was another love letter, It was written on lots and lots and lots of sheets of paper hanging on the laundry lines by laundry pins... I had to put on the light because it was a very dark attic haha. And on all those sheets of paper he asked me if I wanted his child... which I did very much! So a few months later I was pregnant . . .
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Guess Who’s coming to Dinner?
Two artists from very different spheres of art practice brought in easels, paper and drawing materials (the makings of art more usually found in a studio than a gallery) — Gemma Allen, self taught, commercially successful painter, chronicler of the seas, its people and all creatures that swim, float and fly, and Roxanne Grant, a project-based artist favouring nonobject based performance.
‘Guess who’s coming to dinner?’ opened to a gallery of empty walls late in Nov 2009.
Gemma Allen Roxanne Grant 30 October to 29 November 2009
As the days progressed, the artists eased into the process of creating portraits from life. Allen, accustomed more to drawing from imagination in the quiet of her solo practice, applied herself at the easel in the public eye. Grant, already used to a performative element, reconnected with past graphic skills and the progressive installation of gestural drawings developed. The word spread and many local people sat for the artists, resulting in 137 drawings. During the four weeks of work, drawings were hung and rehung, styles of frames were added and rejected, and the work was value-added by both artists. The empty gallery gradually filled with a 15-metre loosely assembled collage.
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Just as the process of creating the exhibition in the space usurped the traditional gallery practice of displaying ‘finished’ works on the wall, Grant and Allen’s finale event — a banquet on the closing night of the exhibition — firmly trampled on the custom of token finger food and a formal launch.
Members of the community turned up to have their portraits done.
Guests to the ticketed event, many of whom were the subject of the drawings, were treated to a feast of local produce and the opportunity to dismantle the exhibition and take any work they wanted from the walls. The communion of dining and the ritualised dismantling of the collective collage engaged the participants in a hands-on performance event.
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Marina Baker Chris Bolton Ralf Mulx Rose Murray 4 December 2009 to 10 January 2010
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Trans-format/act-ion is 16 works by four artists. Early in the conversation between artists in this third group it became clear to each that they drew from quite distinct cultural and language backgrounds. Rose Murray is a Nyabumarta woman from the Pilbara region of WA; Marina Baker a Melbournian, has long lived regionally in the Northern Territory and WA; Chris Bolton hails from the MidWest town of Mingenew; and Ralf E. Mulks used to be German and now lives in Chapman Valley. These varied backgrounds and the diversity of their creative practices sharply defined the goals and intentions of the GPS project, and perhaps set this group the most difficult task to find shared meaning. Not surprisingly, the rich, varied readings possible in language, text and communication developed as their collaborative core. The process of creating the 4x4=16 artworks of Trans-format/act-ion was meandering yet formal. Each artist created a work and communicated this to the next artist by language- spoken or text and visual cues. Sometimes, an object created was simply passed on as a silent package drop at the door. The second artist in the chain made a work by response and this was passed on again and so on, four times around the circle. Utilising their respective skills in writing, painting, assemblage and filmmaking in combination with media new to each, Murray, Baker, Bolton and Mulx created art work which touched on the shared themes and encouraged the emergence of the different global, cultural and linguistic concerns of the individuals. The resulting two- and three-dimensional works in the exhibition were imbued with a sense of uncanny, overlaid history, like the tracework of creases on a much-folded map. As with the two GPS exhibitions preceding trans-format/act-ion, the collaborative process at the heart of the exhibition was equally on display with the final artworks, and the audience again responded with curiosity and enthusiasm.
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Sequence B
Sequence D
1. Baker — Negative News, newspaper and Chinese ink
1. Mulx — Saviour, found objects 2. Bolton — Faith, icon, 3 figurines, 3 stands, mixed media
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2. Mulx — Babylon (Babble-On), found objects
3. Baker — Homage, oil on paper
3. Murray — Txting not Tlking, mixed media
4. Murray — A Message from the Shinglebacks, plastic, tape, polystyrene
4. Bolton — TYM 2 TLK / HRT FLT, greylead on cartridge 1
Sequence A 1. Murray — Poems in a Can, collage, acrylic paint, cardboard 2. Baker— Both Sides, watercolour on rag paper, collage 3. Bolton— I’m Listening, recycled collage
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4. Mulx — The Call, mobile phones
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Sequence C
1. Bolton — Colour my World /Man’s Best Friend, recycled collage
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2. Murray — Portraying Country, collage and acrylic 3. Mulx— Promised Paradise, found objects 4. Baker — Eating our Tail, graphite road rubbing on Chinese paper on foamcore
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GEMMA ALLEN is a self-taught, commercially successful painter, and a chronicler of the sea, its people and all creatures that swim, float and fly.
MARINA BAKER has practised as an artist and teacher since 1981 at all levels of the formal education and Community Arts sectors. Traditional training in oil painting and drawing are the basis of Marina’s work, providing a language of materials and historical references to address contemporary concerns.
RALF MULKS is a video producer, cameraman, gardener, push-biker and musician who likes to be behind rather than in front of the spotlights. He has spent seven years in G-G after a lifetime in Germany. Visual art of the 3D variety has made a late entry into his creative life and he has withdrawn to his plot in the Chapman Valley to tend his potatoes and contemplate its relevence to his life. He’s also the founder of mobileism-mobilism.
artists
ROSE MURRAY — I have always been drawn to good stories: from my mother, nature and country townscapes. I write, paint and make things from recycled stuff. I am always interested in the multiple layers of stories. What we see and hear are limited by our own perceptions.
CHRIS BOLTON — I was born in Geraldton, Western Australia and am a graduate of Edith Cowan University with a BA of Visual Arts.
This project has been a great kickstart for me. Observing other artists techniques and discussing everything imaginable were highlights. Aboriginal artists have a great opportunity to challenge, educate and make people smile. I was under no pressure to do this but guess what? It snuck in.
My work has an eclectic style fuelled by the thrill and riches of discarded objects. The greatest appeal is the evocation of nostalgia and memory, emotional tugs of lost and discarded fragments which hold their own stories. I preserve the evidence of human activity. It allows me to bring forth a new layer or story linked to my own reality and art practice. The unheard words of familiar things.
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GABRIELLE WOODHAMS brings to her art practice years of experience with pattern and dressmaking. Collagraph is a form of printmaking that involves the direct printing of collaged material. She finds inspiration in artists such as Balenciaga and other innovators in fashion history, while being alive to the potential in contemporary clothing from the humble bikini to lingerie and the traditional Australian tradesman outfits. Like all printmakers, she has a passion for paper and is constantly experimenting with textures, fabrics, actual clothing items and different quality inks to achieve her artworks.
ROXANNE GRANT is a project-based artist used to working across many media, favouring the nonobject based, performative end of the art spectrum.
Born in the Netherlands, GERA WOLTJER has been living in Western Australia since early 2008. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Art and Design in Education and a Masters of Education in Arts. She has exhibited her work across the Netherlands and in Australia. Gera lectured in Art and Art Education at the Marnix University in Utrecht and was co-author of visual art programs in the Netherlands. Gera has wide interests and a very experimental bent. She draws and paints, and makes conceptual works, always pushing the media she works with to 15 the limit.
acknowledgments We are grateful to artists Gemma Allen, Marina Baker, Chris Bolton, Roxanne Grant, Ralf Mulx, Rose Murray, Gera Woltjer and Gabrielle Woodhams for their creativity and resilience. Mark Lennard, an instigator of the original version of GPS, provided curatorial feedback during the project; Bernadette Anderson, originally a GPS artist, gave support and advice; James Davies, Director of the Geraldton-Greenough Regional Art Gallery, provided GPS with a venue and supported our funding applications, as did Andrea Selvey, Director of Creative Communities for the Council of Geraldton-Greenough. The team at the Arts and Cultural Development Council (ACDC) assisted by auspicing the successful grant application, and Bradley Dawson of Smith and Brown Design did his magic on this publication with Amanda, and listened patiently to Robyn’s endless grant writing woes. We thank you all.
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Geraldton Regional Art Gallery
trans - act/format - ion Babylon (Babble-On) — Ralf Mulx, 2009
Installation: Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? 2009 17
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