Place / Displace 2001

I PLACE/ DISPLACE

ACE

Place can also invoke a feeling of placelessness.

Where national boundaries and cultural attitudes are defined by an Other, marginalised and displaced peoples

Introduction

Sophie McIntyre Curator

experience a sense of physical dislocation and

Place/Displace is the first exhibition to open at the new Queensland College of Art Gallery at -s by select the College. investment of

South Bank. The tide and concept of this exhibition developed in response to the long­ awaited re-location of QCA Gallery that has now secured its place in Queensland's central cultural precinct.

on man :me public ial gallery or 'rirurional d \·er the be in what they edge. !"ITT 1s proud of

Place/Displace features a selection of mixed media works by eight postgraduate students from QCA. While a number of these artists have exhibited widely and have acquired a national reputation, other artists and their works will be unfamiliar to many. This exhibition endeavours to situate these artists' works within a broader artistic discourse which examines notions of place and

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·ralian

displacement.

Through painting, photography, sculpture, printmaking, and new media, these artists traverse a wide terrain, working through physical and metaphysical spaces, mapping their journeys in an attempt to find a sense of place.

Place is a country, a landscape, or a domestic dwelling that defines our physical borders and cultural perceptions. It might also be a virtual space to which we retreat; or a memory that lies in the recesses of one's mind. Place is a site with which we identify; it engenders a sense of belonging.

cultural detachment. The destruction of the environment, and the growth in travel and technology, can also bring about a sense of physical disorientation and also cultural and spiritual displacement.

Locating themselves within one or more of these spaces, the artists in this exhibition explore and challenge the real and perceived boundaries that define a sense of place. In doing so, their works address a broad range of critical issues which through their sense of place share a common ground.

I would like to thank the artists, who were under excreme pressure to create work in a limited timeframe. Their unflagging enthusiasm was indeed a driving force for us all when working on this exhibition. I would als9 like to thank Liveworm Studio, and in particular Joel Booij, who designed this catalogue.

• �

Detail from Alice Springs to Weipa (2000)

Walker ( 1999)

Donna

Brad

,e patterns of

Donna Marcus is a sculpror whose assemblages,

In his wood and cane sculptural installations, Brad Nunn

.I country rown

which comprise of recycled aluminium and plastic

focuses on the body as a site of physical orientation and

ce on this artist

kitchenware, have been shown in numerous

dislocation. As an artist who has personally experienced rhe

faions and

exhibitions around Australia. Marcus' works are

physical effects of injury, Nunn's sculptural works are imbued

Marcus

Nunn

infused with witticism and whimsy as the artist

with a humanistic sensibility and a wry sense of humour.

se locales with

skilfully transforms the everyday into the

Playful irony is a central element in Nunn's work, as the artist

. to explore the

extraordinary. Using anodised pots and pans,

skilfully reconstructs a variety of prosthetic devices to create

steamers, moulds, and other discarded domestic

hybrid, mutant-like forms that transgress the perceived

utensils, Marcus transgresses the boundaries of the

boundaries of the body.

From country

:arar to

liversity of life at :\s the tides of rs and

commonplace as she re-configures these utilitarian objects ro create anthropomorphic creatures or abstract blocks of colour.

In Bull Rider, Walker, and Gripper (1999), the artist features devices that are commonly used by people with disabilities which he modifies to create works that are at once comical

:rested in

In this work entitled Alice Springs to Weipa (2000),

and confronting. In Bull Rider and Walker, for example,

; t:he quaint crafr

Marcus creates a kaleidoscopic landscape of recycled

Nunn re-adapts these devices, including a prosthetic leg

� :1oral

aluminium saucepan lids, colanders, and cake tins, which

that he re-fashions into a blundstone boot with spurs, and

,,.,J Australia.

are colour-coded ro signify places in "outback" Australia.

a quad stick into an alien, twelve-legged periscopic

draw

On an imaginary road trip, the artist drives through the

creature that appears to emerge from the underworld.

�nsiders are

red earth of Alice Springs, stopping off at country towns including Mt. Isa, Cloncurry, and Normanron, to the coast atWeipa.

L.u�.

ch :.mer

In later works, including Clawfish and Hunter (2000), the artist explores the relationship between nature and technology. Inspired by Donna Haraway's book Cyborg

In this work, Marcus pays tribute roWeipa, a rown that has

Manifesto, Nunn enters into a world where social

played an important role in Australia's hisrory of aluminium

reality and science fiction meet, where the organic and

mining. In I 802 the English explorer, Matthew Flinders, in

the machine converge to produce androgynous, "post­

his diary described the red cliffs nearWeipa. A century and a

human" bodies that float in space and have no

half later, bauxite was discovered, transformingWeipa and

defined sense of place.

signalling the beginning of the aluminium mining industry in Australia.

This sculptural installation is a celebration of these places and their hisrories and of the everyday to which this artist gives new meaning.

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rad Nunn · n and cr:,erienced the -, are imbued • ;::..unour. as the artist ;:o create

rearures

Detail from Still Lives (20001

Culture Cu/It Clan (2001 I

Paula Payne

Janice Peacock

In her paintings, Paula Payne focuses on aspects of

Over the past decade or more, Janice Peacock has been exploring in

history and cultural tradition, which she examines

her arr issues relating to the place and displacement of indigenous

within a modernist discourse. While exploring the

people and their cultures in Australia. As an urban indigenous

processes involved in making art, Payne adopts and

artist from the Torres Strait Islands, Peacock is particularly

subverts the formalist modernist aesthetic to instil

interested in examining the effects of colonialisarion and

into her works a sense of place.

westernisation on her people and culture, and on the way they

While recently travelling through Spain and Portugal,

have been "assimilated" into western society.

the artist visited numerous historical buildings and

In her series of works, tided Culture Cullt Clan (200 I) (sic) and

sacred sires rhar were built by rhe Arabs between the

Between Scenes (2000) the artist re-creates headdresses

11ch and the 15th centuries. Inspired by the geometric

traditionally worn by Torres Strait Islanders to explore the ways

designs in rhe ceramic riles that decorate these

in which indigenous people are exoricised and stereotyped by

buildings, the artist sought to incorporate these Islamic

western society.

motifs into her abstract paintings.

In response to Roger Sandall's highly contentious book tided

This series of works explore the patterns of the past.

The Culturt Cult, Peacock investigates notions of "tribalism"

Collectively titled Still Lives, Payne applies layers of resin

and the way in which the "old" is seen as part of the "new".

and pigment that drip, stain and seep through the cool

By combining traditional and organic forms with man made

white monochromatic surface of these minimalist

objects, including an outboard motor and computer, the

paintings. In doing so, the artist wishes to uncover rhe

artist explores the way in which indigenous cultural

concealed histories and the cultural and spiritual practices

traditions are displaced when displayed as an ethnological

of this region.

object in a museum setting.

Beneath the surface of these quiet, contemplative paintings

In works collectively tided Between Scenes, Peacock re­

is a deep sense of longing for the past and for places that

creates the traditional headdress as a contemporary arr

exist in this artist's memory.

form. In doing so, the artist explores the divide that exists between one's sense of self-identity and the identities to which we are expected to conform. In works including

Christine Anu and Me and My Fair Lady and Me, the artist expresses the way in which we, as women, "play out" our lives according to stereotypes, as we attempt to define our place in society.

3:J\fldSIO / 3:l\fld

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