JAMES TYLOR

JAMES TYLOR DeCookolisation

James Tylor uses daguerreotype and wet plate photographic processes to explore complex issues of identity and cultural representation. These early forms of photography were used to document Indigenous Australian and Maori culture in the 19th century—a link that underpins Tylor’s contemporary investigations into his own Aboriginal, European and Maori descent, and Australia’s colonial past.

In his latest series, DeCookolisation, Tylor uses the Becquerel Daguerreotype to depict places in the South Pacific that were named, by the British, in honour of Capitan James Cook. These include the highest mountain in New Zealand, a town in Northern Australia, and an island nation in the South Pacific—Mount Cook, Cooktown and the Cook Islands.

Using indigenous place names in his artwork titles, however, and finding landscape photographs instead of taking his own, Tylor challenges Cook’s reputation as a heroic ‘discoverer’. Since Aboriginal Australians and Pacific Islanders had been landowners for hundreds or thousands of years before Cook, Tylor suggests that the reality of his fame isn’t one of discovery, but of claiming them for the British Empire.

Mirroring Cook’s unauthorized ‘appropriation’ in the making of DeCookolisation, Tylor sourced images from the Internet without seeking the permission of their original owners. Yet, there is a transformation at play that makes these images conceptually and creatively ‘new’, not least due to the daguerreotype’s mirrored finish. This deliberate shifting of our perceptions renders the borrowed perspectives strange and foregrounds the artist’s intervention, a form of knowing transformation, unlike Cook’s, that is both critical and beautiful.

With the continuing political struggle to ensure just acknowledgement of traditional landowners’ rights, and with issues of artistic copyright and notions of creative ‘originality’ lagging behind a common culture of remix and appropriation, Tylor’s work asks a question that is deeply pertinent to our present-day—when and how is it morally okay to claim other people’s property, and call it your own?

Since graduating in Masters of Visual Arts from the South Australian School of Art, in 2013, James Tylor has achieved considerable success. This year, his work is included in ‘The Skin Off Our Time’, Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia; ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Visual Arts Festival’, Art Gallery of South Australia; and ‘Concrete’, Istanbul Biannual, Turkey. In 2014, he was a finalist in ‘31st Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award’, Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, and in 2013, he was the recipient of the ‘Macquarie Group Emerging Artist Prize’, Sydney, NSW. His works are held in the collections of Art Gallery of Western Australia, National Gallery of Victoria, Macquarie Group, Sydney, Monash University Museum of Art, Kluge Ruhe Aboriginal Art Museum, Charlottesville, USA and Australian Embassy, Washington DC, USA.

LIST OF WORKS series: DeCookolisation, 2015 Te Aoraki, Aotearoa (mount Cook, New Zealand) Te Weheka, Aotearoa (Cook River, New Zealand) Te Moana-a-Raukawa, Aotearoa II (Cook Strait, New Zealand) Aoraki National Park, Aotearoa I (Mount Cook Naitnal Park, New Zealand) Te Moana-a-Raukawa, Aotearoa III (Cook Strait, New Zealand) Gan garr, Guugu Yimithirr nation (Mount Cook National Park, Cooktown, Australia) Avaiki Nui (Cook Islands) Te Moana-a-Raukawa, Aotearoa I (Cook Strait, New Zealand) Aoraki Naitonal Park, Aotearoa II (Mount Cook National Park, New Zealand) becquerel daguerreotypes 10 x 12.7cm

JAMES TYLOR Born Mildura, VIC, 1986 Education: 2013 Master of Visual Art and Design (Photography), South Australian School of Art 2012

Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours (Photography), Tasmanian School of Art

2011

Bachelor of Visual Arts (Photography), South Australian School of Art

Exhibitions: DeCookolisation, Stills Gallery, Sydney (Solo) 2015 The Skin Off Our Time, Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia, Adelaide These are Our Objects, Greenaway Art Gallery Adelaide (Solo) Un-Resettling, Northern Centre for Contemporary Art, Darwin (Solo) 2014

Southern Window, Northern Centre for Contemporary Art, Darwin NT (Solo) Our Mob contemporary, Adelaide Festival Centre, Adelaide SA 135 Meridian East, Australian Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide SA Archaeology of Descent, Marshall Arts, Adelaide SA North, South, East, West, Vivien Anderson Gallery presenting at Fortyfivedownstairs, Melbourne VIC Outlaws, Linden Contemporary Art Space, Melbourne VIC 31st Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award, Muesum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, Darwin NT On men, Canberra Contemporary Art Space, Canberra ACT Victorian Indigenous Art Awards, Art Gallery of Ballarat, Ballarat VIC National Work on Paper Prize, Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, Mornington, Vic Moriendo Renasor, SASA Gallery, Adelaide, SA Bay of Fires Art Prize, Gallery Parnella, St Helen, Tas Seen, Heard and Understood, Prospect gallery, SA Concrete, Monash University Gallery, Melbourne, Vic Un-resettling (Place), Constance ARI, Hobart,Tas (Solo) Past Illusions and Present Realities, Nexus gallery, Adelaide, SA Grid Festival, Coffee Pot, Adelaide, SA

2013

The Analogue lab Exhibition: Alternative Photography on Paper,Glass and Metal, The Mill, Adelaide, SA Decoration and Design: The black object, Australian Academy of Design, Port Melbourne, Vic Distorted: Illusion through the camera lens, Tooth and Nail Gallery, Adelaide,

SA & Constance Ari Gallery, Hobart, Tas Add On, Depot II Gallery,Sydney,NSW On What Grounds, Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute & Adelaide Town Hall,Adelaide, SA First Light, Canberra Contemporary Art space, Canberra, ACT On Men, Feltspace, Adelaide, SA Our Mob, Adelaide Festival Centre, Adelaide, SA & Hong Kong, China Full circle: Visual Arts Graduate exhibition, South Australian School of Art, Adelaide, SA Felt Natural, Torrens River: public art project,Torrens River, Adelaide , SA Macquarie group emerging artist prize, Macquarie group building, Sydney, NSW Past the measuring stick, Marshall Arts Gallery, Adelaide, SA (Solo) 2012

Kodak Salon, Centre of Contemporary Photography, Melbourne, Vic Honours and Master of Fine Art and Design exhibition, Plimsoll gallery , Hobart, Tas Shimmer festival, Penny Hill Gallery’ McLaren Vale, SA Black and white, Tasmanian School of Art, Hobart, Tas UP: Experimental photography of the sky, Tooth and Nail Gallery, Adelaide Cliftons Art Prize, Adelaide, SA

2011

The Shadow Box, Liverpool St Gallery, Adelaide, SA Pingyao International Photography Festival, Pingyao, China 3 found media, Liverpool St Gallery, Adelaide, SA Rare: SASA Graduate Exhibition 2011, SASA Gallery, Adelaide, SA

2010

120 Artist in 12 Weeks,SASA Gallery, Adelaide, SA structural integrity, FELT space/Next Wave Festival ,Melbourne,Vic Kimberley Art Prize, Derby, WA Seed of change, Black Pearl Gallery, Port Adelaide, SA Exquisite corpse collaboration, the Reading Room, Adelaide, SA

2009

Indigenous art exhibition, Flinders medical centre, Adelaide, SA Turning point, Black Pearl Gallery, Port Adelaide, SA symbolic flora, Phat CafĂŠ, Adelaide, SA

Exhibtion Curator: 2013 Distorted: Illusion through the camera lens, Tooth and Nail Gallery, Adelaide, SA & Constance Ari, Hobart, Tas The Analogue lab Exhibition: Alternative Photography on Paper,Glass and Metal, The Mill, Adelaide, SA 2012

Prizes: 2014

UP: Experimental photography of the sky, Tooth and Nail Gallery, Adelaide, SA

Victorian Indigenous Art Awards, Art Gallery of Ballarat, Ballarat VIC (Finalist) 31st Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award, MAGNT, Darwin, NT (Finalist) Bay of Fires Art Prize, Gallery Parnella, St Helen, Tas (Finalist)

National Work on Paper Prize, Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, Mornington, Vic (Finalist) 2013

Cliftons Art Prize, Adelaide, SA (Finalist) Macquarie Group Emerging Artist Prize, Sydney, NSW (Winner)

Publications: Meanjin, Vol 71, No1, 2015 p138-150 Photofile, Vol 96 Mar-May 2015 p 104-111 Artzone, Vol 58 Feb-Apr 2015 Aspire magazine, Feb- Mar 2015, p43 Art Collector, no 71, Jan-Mar 2015, p126-129 Art Monthly Australia, no274, Oct, 2014, p 24-27 & 28-31 Artlink Indigenous, no2 ,vol 34, 2014, p64-66 Collections: Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth, WA National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne VIC Macquarie Group, Sydney, NSW City of Stonnington, Melbourne, VIC Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne, VIC Kluge Ruhe Aboriginal Art Museum, Charlottesville, USA Australian Embassy, Washington DC, USA Private collections in Australia, USA and Aotearoa (New Zealand)

Art Collector Issue 71, Jan-Mar 2015

36 Gosbell Street Paddington NSW 2021 Australia Tel 61 2 9331 7775, Web www.stillsgallery.com.au