Toyota Community Spirit Gallery presents emerging artists from the cities of Hobsons Bay, Port Phillip & beyond
the Butterfly effect
30 March to 24 June 2011 Toyota Australia 155 Bertie Street, Port Melbourne, Victoria Gallery Hours Mon - Fri 9am to 5pm or by appointment. Inquiries Ken Wong 0419 570 846
Toyota Community Spirit Gallery The Toyota Community Spirit Gallery is an initiative of Toyota Community Spirit, Toyota Australia’s corporate citizenship program. Toyota Community Spirit develops partnerships that share Toyota’s skills, networks, expertise and other resources with the community. The Toyota Community Spirit Gallery aims to provide space for artists, especially emerging artists to show their work. The space is provided free of charge to exhibiting artists. No commission is charged on sales and Toyota provides an exhibition launch and develops a catalogue for each exhibition. The gallery has now shown works by over 630 artists. This project is mounted in consultation with Hobsons Bay City Council and the City of Port Phillip.
the Butterfly effect Featuring the works of Kim Anderson Glen Barton Wendy Beatty Julia Bilecki Graham Brindley Robert Bruce Melissa Cameron Alexander Dathe Lynda Dingley Megan Evans Kirstin Finlayson John Gambardella Matthew Harding Jessica Honey Caroline Ierodiaconou Amaya Iturri Anna Jacobson Elizabeth James
Danuta Karski Julie Keating Amy Kennedy Janetta Kerr-Grant Philippe Le Miere Jessica Ledwich Rosie Lovell Larissa MacFarlane Christina Markin Aaron Martin Toby Matheson Ian McKinnon Louise Molloy Rebecca Monaghan Yuki Nakano Hilda Nixon Bradley O’Connor Sharron Okines
Olga Pasechnikova Shining Rainbow Satu Rantanen Anna Robertson Debbie Robinson Emma Rochester D.M. Ross Jack Rowland Sarah Schembri Robert Scholten Ema Shin James Tapscott Daisy Watkins-Harvey Michelle Watson Dominique Wylestone Jack Wylestone
Thanks to Tania Blackwell, Hobsons Bay City Council Louisa Scott, City of Port Phillip Toyota Community Spirit Gallery Committee Katarina Persic, Toyota Australia Steve Blakebrough
Catalogue editing Pre press & Graphic Design
Ken Wong (watcharts.com.au)
Sandra Kiriacos (watcharts.com.au)
IMAGE FRONT COVER That chair, a country road and a woman in a floral dress and red boots (detail) by Glen Barton, Photographic Lambda Print, 2011. INSIDE COVER The Proposal by Bradley O’Connor, Oil on board, 2010. IMAGE THIS SPREAD Unfamilliar (detail) by Jack Rowland, Oil on canvas, 2010. IMAGE BACK COVER Dreaming Bee No 2 (detail) by Megan Evans, Clear acrylic mount with metallic print, 2010. The opinions and points of view expressed by participants through the artworks and artists statements in this exhibition and catalogue are those of the individual person or persons and are not intended to reflect the position of Toyota Australia.
Ken Wong CURATOR
This exhibition is the 25th for the Toyota Community Spirit Gallery since it commenced operations in 2004 and the 8th in a series dedicated to the works of emerging artists. Over 200 applications were received from artists from across Australia, a strong indicator that the reputation of the gallery and our program continues to grow and be recognized as a valuable opportunity throughout the arts community nationally. The exhibition features the works of 52 artists, with a particular focus on local artists from the cities of Port Phillip and Hobsons Bay, but also includes guest artists from all over Australia. It is a snapshot of artistic practice in this country and gives significant insight into the hearts and minds of those in our community who seek to explore and unravel the complexities of living in the modern world through the practice of art. In many ways, the process of artmaking is an expression of personal truth and meaning, reflecting not only the deeper spiritual and psychological concerns of the participating artists, but also of the wider contemporary community of which we are all a part. The Butterfly Effect is a metaphor describing aspects of Chaos Theory developed by the American mathematician and meteorologist Edward Lorenz. His seminal 1979 paper, “Predictability: does the flap of a butterfly’s wing in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?” illustrates how in a complex system, a very small change in initial conditions may have an enormous, far reaching and unpredictable outcome in the longer term. In 1991 he was awarded the Kyoto Prize for Earth and Planetary Sciences, six years before the adoption of the Kyoto Protocol in 1997. These days The Butterfly Effect has been used to describe a myriad of phenomena. From the increasing evidence around the world of global warming and climate change, floods and
hurricanes in Australia and South America and devastating earthquakes in New Zealand and now Japan, to the dramatic political and social changes sweeping the Middle East, and their effect on global oil and commodity prices, it seems our world is in a state of flux that is perhaps a paradgim shift, spiraling from one chaotic and disastrous event to another. What fascinates me about the scientific theory behind the metaphor is the concept that tiny, infinitesimal and seemingly insignificant changes made now, can have an extraordinary effect on the outcome over the longer term. This may even be true for the processes and evolution of the human mind. According to Dr Anthony M. Grant and Alison Leigh, authors of the book Eight Steps to Happiness based on the ABC TV series Making Australia Happy, until recently psychological therapy has focused on reducing negative thought patterns. A recent radical approach which is achieving great results is about identifying positive personality traits and amplifying those, underpinned by the simple strategy that ‘what you focus on grows’. There are few that would argue that we live in chaotic times and that the advent of modern consumerism and exploitation of our finite resources has placed an enormous strain on the natural environment that sustains us all. The times we live in must give us all pause to stop and think about what is important, where we are and where we are going. An old Chinese proverb puts it this way, ‘ If we don’t change direction, we are likely to end up where we are headed’. To begin with, perhaps even the changing of our minds, about the sort of world we want to live in and the sort of future we want for our children, may have an enormous impact on where we end up in the long run. Welcome to the Butterfly Effect.
Ken Wong is the Director of Watch Arts, a Victorian based contemporary arts consultancy. He has worked in the fine arts industry for over 14 years in both commercial and community arts, curating and managing a host of projects including gallery and outdoor sculpture exhibitions.
Exhibitors Page
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Kim Anderson Glen Barton Wendy Beatty Julia Bilecki Graham Brindley Robert Bruce Melissa Cameron Alexander Dathe Lynda Dingley Megan Evans Kirstin Finlayson John Gambardella Matthew Harding Jessica Honey Caroline Ierodiaconou Amaya Iturri Anna Jacobson Elizabeth James Danuta Karski
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Julie Keating Amy Kennedy Janetta Kerr-Grant Philippe Le Miere Jessica Ledwich Rosie Lovell Larissa MacFarlane Christina Markin
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35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48
Aaron Martin Toby Matheson Ian McKinnon Louise Molloy Rebecca Monaghan Yuki Nakano Hilda Nixon Bradley O’Connor Sharron Okines Olga Pasechnikova Shining Rainbow Satu Rantanen Anna Robertson Debbie Robinson
49 Emma Rochester 50 D.M. Ross 51 Jack Rowland 52 Sarah Schembri 53 Robert Scholten 54 Ema Shin 55 James Tapscott 56 Daisy Watkins-Harvey 57 Michelle Watson 58 Dominique Wylestone 59 Jack Wylestone
IMAGE:They never could agree on anything; especially Art (detail) by Julie Keating, Oil on linen, 2010
Kim Anderson GUEST (VIC)
Kim studied writing and editing before changing her focus to visual arts, completing a Bachelor of Fine Art with Honours at University of Ballarat in 2003, followed by her Masters at University of Dundee, Scotland, in 2008. In 2009 she was awarded an Australia Council International Studio Residency at the British School of Rome. She has also studied art conservation and curatorship and has recently finished a year as Artist in Residence at the University of Ballarat Arts Academy.
Curl Up, Ink on paper, 20x27x17cm approx, 2010, NFS
My work has always primarily been inspired by images of the body, in particular the expressive potential of the hands, feet and skin, and the delicate structures and hidden processes taking place internally. Often using my own body as subject, I closely examine the lines,creases,patterns and scars that are unique to me, convinced that in some way they tell the story of my life. This is part of a new series experimenting
in the area between two-dimensional drawings on paper and spatial installations incorporating techniques such as projection and drawing directly onto the walls and floor. It is a playful attempt to bridge the gap between the “white page” and the “white cube”. By folding, curling and cutting holes in the paper, I aim to transform the flat page into a miniature three-dimensional space with which the figures appear to interact.
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glen Barton
GUEST (VIC)
o I am drawn to the world of stories, the ambiguous and the imaginative. My philosophy is that taking photographs is an expression of deepest creativity and engaging with the world around me, a way of being in the moment. I love movies that evoke mood and use stylish imagery, and am also inspired by literature. I seek to create images that evoke emotion, ambiguity and a sense of narrative. Over the last decade, I have learnt from people I admire, taught myself and undergone some formal education, but I still feel like every photo is my first‌ like there is so much to learn, so much to explore and so many stories to tell. That chair, a country road and a woman in a floral dress and red boots Photographic Lambda Print, 97 x 67cm, 2011, $1100
Glen is an emerging photographer from Jan Juc, on Victoria’s Surf Coast. He started taking photos about ten years ago on a borrowed Canon A1 and fell in love with making images immediately. He completed one year of the Diploma of Professional Photography at NMIT but is largely self-taught, continually experimenting and developing new techniques and skills. He has participated in several group exhibitions and held two solo exhibitions of his works.
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Wendy Beatty
GUEST (TAS) REPRESENTED BY Gilligan Grant Gallery
Ecological landscape # 14 (Edition of 1/1) Black and White Photograph, 88 x 139cm (framed), 2010, $1100 Framed / $850 Unframed
This work is part of a series inspired by the geography and surrounds of Southern Tasmania. The image illustrates not only the beauty of one of the most serene and rare eco-environments in Australia but also reflects the tangible, temporal and human experience of emotion, touch and vision within the landscape. All works are one off editions, each handmade negative and print has its
own unique markings and processes. I use traditional black and white darkroom techniques, however, my method centres on a process of deconstructing traditional processes to create alternate meaning, challenging the unified stable order. The process is intended to draw attention to the destabilization of reality, towards a chaos that is seemly lying just below the surface.
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Wendy completed her Degree in Visual Arts with Honours in 1999 and her Masters in 2004. Over the past four years she worked as an art teacher in both Victoria and Tasmania. She is currently a PhD candidate at Deakin University, Burwood.
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Julia Bilecki
GUEST (VIC)
Julia was born and raised in Adelaide. She studied at the Central School of Art and later Roma Mitchell Art Centre before completing a Bachelor of Visual Arts specialising in Painting at the University of South Australia. She has worked as an arts worker for a few years, but it is only in recent times she has prioritized her career as an artist painter and committed to further developing the style and form learned through her practice.
Chance and Intention #2 Oil on canvas, 120 x 120cm, 2009 $1600
My training began with the basics of painting and traditional technical skills. I then went on to further study where the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work. This taught me a range of styles, which has to date played a large role in my art practice. My environment always influenced my themes; my latest
work are layers of fleeting images of urban landscapes that sometimes resolves into disorienting forms; my own rendition of the physical elements in an urban environment. It also examines the daily dynamics of city living, like first time encounters in public spaces as a result of our increasing networked lifestyle.
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graham Brindley GUEST (VIC)
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The whole is greater than the sum of its parts Engraved Welsh Roofing Slates 200 x 150cm, 2010 POA
Graham was born in the United Kingdom. He studied art in Melbourne then taught art in various schools and institutions. He has devoted most of his professional career to being an art educator, but has recently refocussed on his own practice, completing his Masters of Visual Art at VCA. Re-engaging with study and the current contemporary art discourse has been both stimulating and instrumental in a total reinvention of his practice and outlook.
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My work resides somewhere in a shadowy, ambiguous place where drawing and installation intersect. Focussing on what it is to be human, I explore thoughts, text and language with fundamental materials and processes physically and tangibly linked to the earth. This reflects my interest in the synthesis between the intellect and the primal. Slate, like ourselves, has a mineral connection to the earth and is our most basic writing tablet. Calligraphic text made up of stream of conscious thought is engraved into its surface forming an image of a human brain, referencing the significance of the thoughts, deeds and words that determine our true identity. The composite grid of twenty discrete units depends on the cohesive whole to decipher the sum of its parts.
Robert Bruce
GUEST (NSW)
n I have quite an extensive knowledge of traditional photographic techniques, but have just moved into digital photography and editing on my computer which is amazing. My aim is to capture and portray the dream like, supernatural images that swirl in my mind. I have recently discovered a passion for clowns and the link to real-life that images of clowns can portray. Through exploration of this I have come to a single phrase which seems to sum up my explorationwasn’t he me? It is a statement on all that is corrupted in our own personal journeys, the darker side of humanity. I hope to show the world my mind, for are we not all clowns at heart.
And wasn’t he me? Digital image/photograph, 52 x 41cm, 2010 $400
Robert developed a passionate love of art while watching his father as he studied art at University. He studied art during HSC, entering the Ilford Photography competition. He has always practiced drawing in charcoal and conte, but has recently become more dedicated to his art making, with a specific focus on photography.
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Melissa Cameron CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
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Patterns are omnipresent in the natural and human-engineered world; those found in one context are often repeated in another, sometimes deliberately, but often as a part of natural evolution. My work draws on the symmetric pattern-making operations of Euclidean geometry; translation, rotation and reflection. Arising from flat patterns drawn in AutoCAD, each work depends on the tension of the cable against the weight of the strung elements to create space. In this way they emulate complex architectural forms, yet the fragile linkages between parts are reminiscent of the invisible ties that interweave seemingly independent organic structures into an ecosystem. This delicate balance speaks to a universal truth; the inextricable interdependence between the elements of any system. Melissa holds a Masters in jewellery and metalsmithing from Monash University and is also a Bachelor of interior architecture. This year she will undertake a residency at the Centre for Fine Print Research at the UWE in Bristol and her work will feature in the Love Lace exhibition at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney. Last year her works featured at the Jewellers and Metalsmiths Group of Australia conference in Perth, where she also delivered a paper on her practice. Her works also feature in an exhibition touring Florence, Munich and Poland this year. Top: Tobacco Tin Set (brooch, pin + container), Jewellery (recycled steel), 8x8x4cm, 2010, $1200 Middle: Eight Point Powder Case set (brooch/pin) Jewellery (recycled metal), 8x8x4cm, 2009, $680 Left: Planar Radial Pattern – Coaster (brooch/ pendants), Jewellery (recycled metal), 10x10x2cm (+80cm neckpiece), 2010, $450
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Alexander Dathe
GUEST (VIC)
Building in Tasmania, Mixed media, 45 x 60cm, 2010, $250
My approach to painting and drawing is to delve into the unknown. I’m relying on a new level of consciousness to make marks. Usually these marks are made to interpret and end as chaos, but sometimes (for my eye) it becomes an ordered chaos that makes complete sense. It speaks to me like no other art
form; posing questions that keep me searching and wanting to explore. This is a desolate building I came across when I was driving through Tasmania in early 2010. I had a photograph to refer to, but for the majority of the painting process I just let the brush marks guide me.
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Alexander is 28 years of age and moved to Melbourne in 2010. He is currently in his last year of study for a Diploma of Visual Art from CAE.
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Lynda Dingley
GUEST (VIC) REPRESENTED BY ART UNLIMITED
Tracing the Tides (near Camperdown), Acrylic on canvas, 46 x 92cm, 2011, $550
As a mature person I have, in the past two years, discovered my true life’s journey as an artist. I now feel confident that I have both the ability and maturity to stay focussed and to develop my work practise and achieve a body of work that will take me forward. As an indigenous person I find the basis of my
work comes from my heritage. My love of this country is paramount to the genesis of my paintings while development is fed by interaction with established artists. Images are distilled in my sketchbooks from pictures, memories and imagination and then translated into paintings.
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Seeking a new career after being confined to a wheelchair in 2007, Lynda turned to her passion for painting and now works at Art Unlimited Studio in Geelong. Her paintings are influenced by both her Aboriginal heritage and a love for Australia. As an emerging artist she has set herself challenges that she is determined to achieve.
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Megan Evans
GUEST (VIC) REPRESENTED BY BoxoFFICE, New York
k This work shows a bee at close quarters and invites the viewer to consider a singular bee. It subverts the natural history perspective of an insect by the soft focus and the title, which asks the viewer to consider what a bee might dream of or for. Photography is used to ‘capture’ the bee in a moment of reverie, or is it in fact dead? Bees are responsible for the pollination of one in three mouthfuls of our daily food but are under threat from a mysterious disease called Colony Collapse Disorder. These three works all use the bee as a metaphor for human social behaviour. Bees can organise themselves as a super organisms, thinking as one rather than as individuals. Humans struggle to do that and this inability may be the source of our demise. Megan is a multidisciplinary artist, working in video, photography, sculpture, and installation but has a background in painting and drawing. Her work engages with the nature of community and relationships and her interest lies in the role of art as a dynamic for social transformation. Her practice ultimately involves a mix of conceptual issues and aesthetic concerns. Her current projects encompass an exploration of ‘human swarming’ in the face of the turmoil of climate change.
From top: Dreaming Bee No 1 Dreaming Bee No. 2 & Dreaming Bee No. 3 Clear acrylic mount with metallic print 51 x 78cm, 2010, $2800 each
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Kirstin Finlayson CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
My Sister and I, Lost wax, lead crystal glass casting, 11x29x23cm, 2010/11, $1295 for pair
My work surrounds itself with issues of memory and childhood. It is often a reflection on a particular memory that through reconfiguration is being transformed from a negative memory to a positive expression of survival; in creating my work my goal is to reflect a certain childhood
charm and honesty. My Sister and I, is a very personal reflection on the experience of childhood and growing up. I aim to challenge the viewer’s idea of the ‘innocent bunny’ requiring them to look more deeply into the object revealing a more threatening aspect.
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Kirstin is currently undertaking a Masters Degree at Monash University where she is exploring the ornamentalisation of found objects and bric-a-brac which carry no obvious intrinsic value or purpose. By collecting outmoded and unloved objects and re-casting them in glass, she re-contextualises the objects sending them back into the world renewed and reborn. Having undergone this transformation the object now has a new purpose and has become an object all on its own, a precious commodity; a one of a kind collectible.
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John gambardella
CITY OF HOBSONS BAY
Born in Trieste, Italy, John trained as an accountant but throughout his life, has followed a keen interest and ongoing self-development in fine art. In 2005 he took a decision to pursue his art full time. He has exhibited in various art awards and exhibitions including The Norvill Art Prize (NSW), Redlands Art Awards (QLD) and the ANL Maritime Art Prize in Melbourne. Since 2006, he has exhibited in Art in Public Places as part of the Hobsons Bay City Council program of exhibitions and events.
Road train (South of Darwin) Acrylic/oil on canvas, 100 x 100cm, 2010, $3000
I am a realist by nature and this I believe is reflected in my art. My paintings are from real places that surround me or I have visited over time – they have been adapted and depicted from sketches and images taken. I work in a variety of mediums, including oils, acrylics, enamels, watercolours and
pastels. I am just at home painting landscapes and seascapes as I am with contemporary subjects. I am conscious of creating my own style, rather than being influenced by others. My direction in art is to seek and define new boundaries, and to excite and evoke interest to the viewer.
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Matthew Harding CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
Amcor #1 from the series Paper Recycling, Archival Pigment Print, 100 x 80cm, 2010, $550
My research is lead by the short and long term future of industrial sites located within suburbia. These constructions look at the very way we exist. Intrinsic to the environment in which we are constructed, lies a landscape we have transformed and continue to transform. I am interested in this space between the physical fabrics of the man-made and our lives, enacting within it.
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After completing high school in 2006 Matthew commenced a Bachelor of Fine Art majoring in photography at RMIT. In 2009 he deferred studies to travel the world taking photos across America, Europe and Asia, returning in 2010 to completed the final year of his fine art degree.
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Jessica Honey GUEST (VIC)
s This work comes from a series of figurative paintings based upon images of children sourced from children’s fashion magazines. Through painting I explore the relentless imaging of designer brands, and the process of psychological transference in relation to portraiture and print media. This project also explores the demonstration of extreme wealth and the imitation of adult behavior and roles by children through their posture, facial expression, direct gaze, clothing and body language.
Ladia Acrylic and Oil on Board, 42 x 29.7cm, 2010, $500
Originally from New Zealand, Jessica completed a Bachelor of Media Arts (Fine Art) Honours at Waikato Institute of Technology, Hamilton in 2005. She has been living in Melbourne now for six years and recently completed her Masters of Fine Art at RMIT. She has been invited to be part of the annual exhibition, Debut IIV at Blindside this year and is very enthusiastic about further developing her practice.
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Caroline Ierodiaconou CITY OF HOBSONS BAY
Caroline graduated from The Victorian College of The Arts in 2002 with a Fine Art Degree. She has exhibited widely since graduating with both solo and group shows in commercial and artist-run galleries. In 2009 she exhibited at The Melbourne Art Fair as well as, ‘Platform,’ an artist initiative in the City of Melbourne. In the same year she spent three months in Asia, returning to Beijing in 2010 for a residency at Red Gate Gallery. She also held a solo exhibition at the Melbourne City Library and will exhibit again with Platform art space in 2011.
Growing Pains Oil on canvas, 97 x 97cm, 2011, $5000
My work explores culture, identity, consumerism and environmental concerns and is a meditation on the times in which we live. The work often depicts humanity as fragmented and incomplete, at war with both itself and the rest of nature, but there is also a lighter, whimsical side, representing the vulnerability, foibles and quirks of being human. On a recent residency
to China I observed that due to the huge population and rapid rates of growth and development many of these issues are magnified and accelerated. This piece reflects the discrepancy between the promises and allure of advertising with the reality of people’s lives and the rise and representation of the individual in contemporary society and artistic practice.
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Amaya Iturri
GUEST (VIC) REPRESENTED BY 19 karen contemporay art space
Kid Soldier, Acrylic on cotton, 137 x 165cm, 2010, $5100
I work predominantly with portrait subjects commenting on war. The birth of my first child inspired me to look at the reality of so many kids who suffer because of this madness. The works often serve as representative statements rather
than individual portraits. The scale is also significant, often staring directly at the viewer, establishing a direct physical relationship. The colour is important and also a contradiction used to create tension in the paintings.
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Amaya studied art and art conservation in her native Spain. She worked as an Art Conservator and was fortunate to travel and work in several different cities before moving to Australia in 2003. She became a mother in 2006 and while that created a break in her painting practice, she has now resumed her artistic pursuits with a new sense of purpose.
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Anna Jacobson GUEST (QLD)
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Across The Lava Fields Giclee Print on Photo Rag, 100 x 100cm, 2011, $900
Anna Jacobson is a 23 year old artist from Brisbane. In 2008 she won the Emerging Artist Prize at the Evolve Arts Festival in Byron Bay and her work toured in the Vivid National Photography Festival in Canberra. In 2009 she graduated with a Bachelor of Photography with Honours from the Queensland College of Art. In the same year she won the Queensland Poetry Festival Filmmakers Award for her work ‘Of Ochres and Ruins’ which was screened at the Judith Wright Centre and she has exhibited at the Queensland Centre for Photography. More of her works can be viewed at www. annajacobson.com.au.
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My art practice explores old spaces and surreal environments, memory, diaspora and imagined narratives through photography, performance, video and soundscapes. Across the Lava Fields is from my series Travel By Rocking Chair. Vast environments are created by small-scale rock formations found in the natural landscape. The figure travels through each scene, enabling the viewer to journey into these challenging environments and let their own imagined story unfold.
Elizabeth James
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
Casino Precinct, Acrylic, pastel and charcoal, 124 x 153cm, 2010, $2800
My work embraces both people and place as integral to each other, navigating between the intimate organic realm of portraiture and the human form, and the more analytical geometry and mood of the city. I tune into the histories of these subjects and how they intersect with each other, in grave and comic
ways, building layers of sometimes unrelated drawing experiences together in search of a greater, more intriguing whole. Here I have tried to portray the sense of drama and darkness associated with the Casino in psychological terms through the external environment that surrounds it.
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Elizabeth has lived and worked in the City of Port Phillip for nearly 20 years, as an artist, arts worker and tutor. She has exhibited regularly in solo, joint and group exhibitions across Melbourne and on occasion interstate and internationally. She has pursued overseas studies in China and in 2009 completed a Masters in Painting in New York. Living overseas for two years provided opportunity to visit significant international museums, collections, and touring exhibitions, both in America and Italy, resulting in major transformations in her creative process and output.
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Danuta Karski GUEST (VIC)
Danuta studied chemistry in her native Poland and has a background in science, but art has always been a major part of her life. She successfully exhibited oil paintings in Poland and New Zealand, but it was only after moving to Australia that she decided to extend her knowledge by studying for a Diploma of Arts at Gordon Institute, Geelong. She has since completed a Bachelor of Visual Arts in 2010, majoring in sculpture. Her art practice is multidisciplinary, and includes oil painting, fine art photography, sculpture and installation.
Cart Bronze and marble, 10x22.5x28cm, 2010 $2300
As I consider art to be a reflection on one’s life, simultaneously concealing and revealing it, I explore in my work the human psychology – the conscious impulses and the unconscious drives, and an individual’s place in relation to society. Through observation and analysis of personal interaction with the surrounding world, I create metaphoric imagery. I challenge the spectator to look beyond the obvious recognisable image, to see what depths are hidden. By combining different realistic forms
and juxtaposing them, I want to construct a somewhat surreal world with its own dialogue which will generate mental stimulus in viewers, holding their attention to encourage a deeper understanding of humanity. My works evoke a sense of isolation and solitude of the human being, both psychological and physical, experienced in modern society; they often bring to mind thoughts of continuance, passage of time and endurance, bringing focus to timeless universal issues of humanity and its question of being.
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Julie Keating GUEST (VIC)
o We are born without a choice of our physical appearance, intelligence or character, and this is reflected in my birds. They never get to choose the paper they are made out of or how that paper might affect their characters. In this painting there are three birds in the likeness of works by three Dutch painters; Piet Mondrian, Vincent Van Gogh and Hieronymus Bosch and one Antipodean, Sidney Nolan. They are vastly separated by time and space and yet are drawn together by their artistic characters and their innate interest in art but by the very substance of their natures forever destined to disagree.
They never could agree on anything; especially Art Oil on linen, 50 x 50cm, 2010, $1500
Julie trained at Latrobe Street College of Art and New Media and has been exhibiting her paintings over the past 5 years. She has been painting this origami series for about 3 years now. They are very time-consuming works because of the level of detail involved in both preparation and execution. On average it takes her about 10 hours to paint a bird but that can easily double depending on the complexity of the subject. There is always a narrative to her work that often includes an element of dark humour or irony. She greatly admires both the technique and quiet intimacy achieved by the early Dutch painters and strives for a similar feel in her paintings. She has visited The Netherlands and hopes to have the opportunity to exhibit there in the next year or so.
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Amy Kennedy GUEST (VIC)
Vibration Series Artist blend glaze material, 7x14x15cm, 2010, $400
In my sculptural works, fine paper-thin leaves of glaze material are assembled to form layered objects. Working with delicacy and movement, I use the flowing layers like the opening pages of a book or fluttering piles of fabric to create a windblown or whirlpool effect, leading inwards, often to a hidden core. Energy and movement within the work is assisted by the gentle softening that occurs during the firing process, giving sculptures the capacity to hover, tilt or extend, as if once animated. It is capturing this energy and creating work that is seemingly made and found simultaneously, that is a particular aspiration.
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Traditionally, in the medium of ceramics, glaze is used on the exterior of objects as a functional or decorative surface. In Amy’s practice she transform this thin glaze layer from a surface into the building material itself. The glaze thus becomes a skin or sheet from which forms can be constructed. It was during her studies at RMIT that she began the development of this material and devised techniques of construction. After graduation she undertook a 3 month residency at the European Ceramic Work Centre in The Netherlands to advance her work and experiment with new ideas. Since returning to Australia she has continued creating, exhibiting and developing her practice.
Janetta Kerr-Grant
GUEST (VIC)
k My current work is characterised by imagery drawn from travelling by road at night. When the sky is black there are only the lit-up traffic signs and the dazzling headlights from oncoming cars. I wanted to capture that fleeting transformative feeling. The signladen lanes of traffic of the daytime are softened into a more ambiguous and rich landscape. These experiences have begun to seep into my work as a ceramicist. These two stoneware vessels depict the constant procession of streetlights, headlights and taillights and the glowing beauty of long haul trucks.
Night Driving - Long Haul, Ceramic, 7x27x27cm, 2010, $350
Night Driving - Streetlights, Ceramic, 7x28x27cm, 2010, $350
Janetta has been practicing ceramics for the past five years and is currently studying at the Arts Academy at Ballarat University. Her regular commute along the Western Highway in all seasons and weather has made her keenly observant of the physical environment, both industrial and pastoral. She is influenced by the elemental quality of the landscape and is keen to instil this quality into her ceramics. The vessels feature soft loose forms that are thrown and then hand carved into shape. They often have sinuous undulating rims aimed at deliberately slowing a viewer’s gaze.
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Philippe Le Miere CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
Melancholia, Oil on canvas, 38 x 50.5cm, 2011, $299
The main focus of my art is the study of dreams and the reasoning of the unconscious. My creative process begins with the daily recording of a dream sketch diary. From these drawings further active imagination sketches are made. Active Imagination is a term from Analytical Psychology, first used by Jung to describe the process of projecting unconscious content. During this
creative stage I am activating my imagination using the recollection of recorded dream memory. Imaginative imagery is then ‘projected’ onto the canvas through the action of painting. Rather than working from an observable reality, I am drawing from the observations of my ‘mind’s eye’. Melancholia is titled after Albrecht Durer’s famous allegorical engraving of the same name.
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Philippe was born in Melbourne in 1975 and graduated a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Victorian College of the Arts in 1997. He has worked in arts education and is an active member of the arts community in the City of Port Phillip.
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Jessica Ledwich
GUEST (VIC)
Atlantis #3, Type-C Print, 50 x 75cm, 2010, $400
My work aims to hold a mirror to human behaviour be it absurd, humorous or intriguing. I seek to unmask the more ironic nature of how western culture both defines and expresses itself. This piece speculates upon how oceans of time submerge the relics of our history. As technology develops, we continue to search the past for inspiration. The searchlight of
memory sweeps the oceans floor only to find what has existed before us. While the form might change, the function stays the same; to record, to replay and to remind us who we are and where we have come from. When our present lives are recorded in such an intangible form, will our future ever outlive its past?
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Jessica is a photo-media artist based in Melbourne. She originally trained in orchestral music, completing a Bachelor of Performing Arts at Monash University, but has since found her true calling in photography and is building upon her formal photographic studies. She was recently selected as 1 of 15 top emerging art photographers in Australia by the ACMP and will be a feature artist in the Spring Edition of U.S Art magazine Visual Overture.
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Rosie Lovell GUEST (VIC)
Tanks R Us #1 Oil on linen, 61 x 87cm, 2010, $1500
Tanks R Us #2 Oil on linen, 61 x 87cm, 2010, $1500
Over years of moving to different countries and cultures I have consistently been sustained by visual art as a mean of understanding humanity and environments. lt is a language I can’t stop myself using to express ideas and my response to what I see and feel. These multiple moving experiences around the globe made me appreciate the value of the natural environment in terms of its power to give you a sense of place. The current destruction and looming threat to nature fills me with a sense of urgency to create images that are linked to these issues. At the same time I have
always been fascinated by items or visual manifestations that gradually start infiltrating our daily lives and environments, gaining iconic status for a particular decade or time period. Once upon a time, actually quite recently, rainwater tanks started to appear everywhere. People began to squeeze them into tiny front and back gardens. You would see numerous fullpage advertisements for rainwater tanks and many “Tank water in use” signs on picket fences. They started to crowd my view, they loom large, like the problem they represent. No happy ending yet.
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Rosie was born in Switzerland and lived in France, USA and South Africa before emigrating to Australia in 1978. She completed a Diploma of Visual Arts at the College of Adult Education in Melbourne in 2007. Since then she has continued her education with short courses and workshops and is developing her career through her studio practice and exhibitions.
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Larissa MacFarlane
CITY OF HOBSONS BAY
Larissa’s journey as an artist began a decade ago after a head injury enhanced her visual perceptions. She recently completed a Diploma in Visual Arts at the CAE, majoring in Printmaking. In recent years, she has exhibited consistently, particularly in Melbourne’s west where her work as a printmaker is becoming well known. She has held 3 successful solo shows in the annual Hobson’s Bay Art in Public Places, one of which was a runner up in 2009. In 2010, she won the Wyndham Contemporary Art Prize, the Victorian Mental Health Week Art Award, as well as the RASV Printmaking Prize (also in 2008 and 2009). Her work is represented in the collections of the Maribyrnong City Council, Mind, TAC and the Mental Health Foundation, as well as private collections in Australia and overseas.
A Puddle of Turbines, after Escher Linocut, 3 colour block, 50 x 47cm, 2010, $450
Living in Melbourne’s West, I am inspired by its physical and cultural environments, its industrial history and recent changes with gentrification. I am interested in exploring what it means to live at the intersection of the industrial, the suburban and the natural worlds and the ways that we coexist with technologies and structures that at the same time, we can be so disconnected from. Depicting these subjects within the traditional format
of printmaking may enable us to look anew and (re)examine our contemporary urban landscapes. I also draw inspiration from my experience of illness and disability and its associated experience of separateness, to investigate ideas of belonging and place, healing and change and ways that we can celebrate what we have here and now. I am motivated by the poetry of those everyday challenges that we all must confront, both individually and globally.
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Christina Markin GUEST (VIC)
After the Revolution, Mixed media on board, 60 x 90cm, 2011, $1200
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I look for my painting to give me the unexpected. I do not aim to reproduce what I’ve seen, but rather to relive the experience of the space. My recent work explores an abandoned factory in Brunswick, where I am interested in the intimacy and immensity of industrial landscapes. I try to capture what is, and what is not.
Christina completed an honours degree in visual arts in Canada over a decade ago but has spent more than six years travelling through Europe and an additional three years of full time study at university, most recently completing a Post-Grad Diploma in Fine Arts at VCA. She is a committee member of the artist run space, Gallery 69 where she exhibits regularly in group exhibitions. She is also promoting herself online and will shortly be shown on ARTWORLD.tv and the Saatchi online gallery. Her primary focus is painting, but she also uses a range of 2D materials in her work and is currently planning a solo exhibition in 2012.
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Aaron Martin
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
Aaron was born in Bridgetown, WA but currently lives and works in Melbourne from his studio in St Kilda where he also conducts life drawing classes. He completed his Fine Arts Degree in 1992 and works as a Lecturer at Swinburne University and Melbourne School of Arts. He has twice been a finalist in the John Leslie Art Prize and his studio practice encompasses drawing, oil painting and small watercolour works.
Untitled, Oil on canvas, 122 x 168cm, 2010, NFS
In 2006 I developed a series of work investigating the concept of holidaying and camping, and how these various rituals inform antipodean culture and yet in certain ways destabilised those very fabrics. These mostly small intimate oils on canvas were developed in the style of early Australian romantic painting, referencing the paintings of early colonial plein air style painting. The commitment to the concept is demonstrated in this painting ‘Untitled’ 2010, where the concept of travel and journeys are explored. Aspects of leaving and homing of wandering and belonging are tested. While we are presented with the image
of the belle vista : a landscape, open and endless, a space of natural unbridled charm and wonderment, we are perpetually reminded of it’s underlying fragility, and of it’s frail existence. In recent time there has been a shift from the landscaped based paintings to a more studio based approach, albeit informed by the landscape and the object. This investigation has led me to grow a fascination for the natural environment, evolutionary science, and mythology. Through these paintings I attempt to understand how still life painting can be an inspired vehicle for the exploration of how meaning is generated by objects.
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Toby Matheson
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP REPRESENTED BY Arts Project Australia
The Espy, Acrylic on canvas, 30 x 40cm, 2007, $140
Toby has been attending and exhibiting at Arts Project Australia for the last 5 years. He has been part of a number of group shows as well as exhibiting a solo show in 2009 titled Scenes of St Kilda, at 2 Brothers Brewery, Moorabbin. Toby is steadily developing his practice and is working to establish a solid reputation with the public and collectors at Arts Project Australia and other galleries.
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u I work predominantly in acrylic on canvas, presenting comic book realism that captures figures in urban scenes around St Kilda and Melbourne. Often in the foreground, the female figure is a common element and her gaze often meets that of the viewer in a knowing fashion.
Ian McKinnon
GUEST (VIC)
k I have worked in the textile industry for 28 years, becoming redundant in 2008. In 2009 I started producing wallhangings that appealed to many people, so I have developed more designs with a view to offering some for sale. I believe that the new direction I am taking in my work has become more of an artistic expression, so entering into art shows is a way of seeking wider exposure.
Ian is a handweaver and designer of decorative wallhangings with the ability to design specific pieces to suit end user’s requirements. He has spent a number of years handweaving rugs and narrow bands for personal use, and is now creating a very different kind of textile wallhanging.
Flowing 3d Textile, 200 x 80 x 12cm, 2010 $850
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Louise Molloy CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
g I use analogue photography techniques including incamera manipulation of colour, infra-red and B&W film; alternative processes such as salt printing; and hand-colouring as well as digital software to create my images. Thematically, I like to explore the landscape both natural and built, its shadows, spaces and lines, to evoke the cultural and emotional interpretations attached to my perception. Often in recreating the landscape I form patterns with montage as in this work. Although there are no people in my landscapes, there is often evidence of human occupation, a play on the idea of terra nullius. Cycling_1 Photo montage, 50 x 44.5cm, 2008, $300
Since studying photography in 1999, Louise has taken part in group exhibitions as well as contributing images to an online poetry zine. She believes poetry and photography have much in common as forms of expression. She has lived in the City of Port Phillip for the past 12 years and the bay itself and life along its shores have become an important part of her work. She is currently working towards her first solo exhibition.
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Rebecca Monaghan CITY OF HOBSONS BAY
The Herd: Thrive, Oil on canvas, 94 x 105cm, 2011, $1250
It is my love of the tactile and the process of ‘making’ that drives my current practice. First I create the paper models by screwing up pieces of paper with my hands. This process began as a rather dry academic exercise of still life drawing. I chose the challenge of drawing screwed up pieces of paper, thinking that I was exploring the qualities of tone and the white paper as I described the light and
shadow on the creases and folds. But ultimately from creases and folds I found lines that created unusual forms that I could not help but read as biomorphic shapes. I have continued to explore this anthropomorphic view of inert matter, with the intention of asking questions about how we see and understand community and society; how we read the world around us and its amazingly diverse creatures.
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Rebecca studied design at RMIT, completing undergraduate studies in 1996. Since then she has been involved with several community art groups including the Footscray Community Art Centre and The Substation in Newport. Last year she started the transition out of her career working in design in an IT corporate environment and returned to art school. She studied painting part time at VCA and will begin a graduate course this year.
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Yuki Nakano GUEST (QLD)
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Natural Delight of Spring Mixed media on paper, 48 x 54cm, 2010 $410
Yuki is an artist working in the fields of illustration, design, and photography. She was born and raised in Tokyo, Japan, and has been living and working in Brisbane since 2008. She is represented by 19Karen Contemporary Art Space on the Gold Coast, exhibited a solo show at Hanasho Flower and Art, and has participated in various group shows within Australia and internationally. Her artworks have been published internationally and she has contributed various types of artwork to clients including Google and Firefox.
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With my work, I like to explore humans connecting with their physical and psychological landscape using the styles and techniques of manga (Japanese cartoon) and traditional and modern craft and pattern work and collage. The narratives of familiarity within unfamiliarity are expressed by daily objects and sceneries I have encountered in real life or in a dream. The female figures are self portraits, and express my emotions and relationships to the surroundings.
Hilda Nixon
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
High Country, Oil on canvas, 36 x 75cm, 2010, $140
q I belong to the U3A Port Phillip. We have art groups and take part in community art shows, displaying our art in local restaurants with other artists in the community. I enjoy painting, sharing ideas with other artists, learning to appreciate many forms of art and expressing what I see. This country scene is near Mansfield, Victoria. The lovely old trees and farmhouses in the background and the vivid changing colour of the hills made the theme for this painting.
Hilda has lived in the city of Port Philip all her life. She has followed her keen interest in painting for many years, with the Middle Park painting class and with U3A art. She first started at the Montague School in South Melbourne and the first art show she entered was the Herald Sun outdoor art show held in the Treasury Gardens, Melbourne in the late 1970’s. In recent years she has been able to devote more time and energy to her painting.
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Bradley O’Connor CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
The Proposal, Oil on board, 73.5 x 93cm, 2010, NFS
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I strive to make works that are both beautiful and challenging to the viewer and to myself as an artist. I am currently working on a series inspired by the style of the pre-raphaelites and other artists from that period. This piece captures a moment in time. A beautiful girl conflicted with a question, flees to the woods.
Bradley attended St George Art School and graduated in 2000 with an Advanced Diploma of Fine Arts. He has exhibited in Melbourne and Sydney and in 2003 was hung in the Archibald Prize ‘Salon des refuse’. In 2008 he was awarded first prize in the Paint the Streets art competition in Elwood and is continually working to develop and build a platform for his practice.
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Sharron Okines GUEST (VIC)
x LOVE LETTER This print is from a body of work entitled “Love Letter�, which is a series of linocut, drypoint and aquatint etching prints that have been inspired by images of my husband at work. I enjoy the disciplines of printmaking, from the simple lines in linocut prints to the alchemy of processing plates to achieve the images held in the mind. I hope my interpretations will draw attention to the unseen familiar and create dialogue around the quietly diligent men who ensure one of our most essential services.
Danger Drypoint etching/chine colle, 58.5 x 49.5cm, 2010 Framed $230 / Unframed $160
Sharron completed her Diploma of Visual Arts in 2010 with High Distinctions, Majoring in Printmaking. She was awarded the Printmaking Encouragement Award by Chisholm Institute Frankston. Sharron was selected as a finalist for the Mary and Lou Senini Student Award for Printmaking 2010 at McClelland Gallery and Sculpture Park and also recently selected to participate in a Printmaking Group show at Brunswick Street Gallery. More of her work can be viewed at sharronokines.weebly.com.
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Olga Pasechnikova GUEST (VIC)
p The portrait of a little beautiful girl of Slavic origin living in Australia who is a student of mine for three years now. She is very talented and spiritualised girl and hugs in her arms a traditional Russian doll, Petrushka (a little clown), which she made herself during one of my classes.
Alyona Oil on canvas, 60 x 75cm, 2010, $3500
Olga was born on Ukraine in the city of Zaporizhzhya in 1968. At the age of 10 she became a student at an art school supported by a government education program for gifted children. She went on to art college and in 1989 took her degree in Fine Arts and Drafting. She became a teacher and in 1994 was accepted at The Academy of Fine Arts to study for her Baccalaureate and Masters in Graphics which she completed in 2000. In 2001 she was accepted into The Society of Russian Artists in St Petersburg where she exhibited regularly until migrating to Australia in 2004. After taking some time to settle into her new life, including formal studies in English language, she undertook study at the University of Melbourne Faculty of Art History for a Masters in Arts Curatorship (2007-2009). Since then she has worked as a full time artist and teacher in mediums of oils, watercolour, pastel and clay. She is now focussed on building her career as an Australian based fine artist.
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Shining Rainbow
GUEST (NSW)
Rainbow lives and works in Thirroul, NSW. She began her formal art training in 1995 with an Open Learning course in drawing and went on to complete an Advanced Diploma of Fine Arts in 2000. She has worked at her professional practice since that time, balancing this pursuit with the demands of raising her 7 year old son. Her work makes use of many media including watermiscible oil, acrylic, gouache and ink.
the lord of the dance makes time stand still Mixed media on canvas, 91 x 91cm, 2010, $10,000
Ever since I was a child, painting and drawing have been vital to me; to the development of my understanding of myself and the world. My art involves sensitivity to the complexity and integration of human relationships with the universe. We are carriers of consciousness, but how often do we ask what consciousness is or who we are? Infinite diversification, sometimes fragmentary or even
conflicting, exists within a greater unity of which consciousness itself is a reflection. Infinity within and infinity without and the pivot-point between the two, where the potential for true creativity exists, are the themes and the explorations of my artwork. The crow stands as a dark omen. He is the death that allows new life to be. He is the shadow that holds the shape.
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Satu Rantanen GUEST (NSW)
n I want to touch people’s hearts and make them think through my art. My piece Will shows the more positive side of horrible circumstances so many people live in. The truth is not only what our eyes see, in those starving skinny bodies of young kids lies also hunger for life. These poor kids still have so many hopes and dreams and so much love to give, they have a strong will to live and they are not here to give up. Will Graphite pencil and coloured charcoal on paper 77 x 57cm, 2011, $750
Satu was born in Seinajoki, Finland in 1980 and migrated to Australia in 2007. She discovered the beauty of drawing at the age of 13, and hasn’t stopped drawing since. She never really thought of art as a career and studied Tourism at university in Finland, graduating with a Bachelor’s Degree. Most of her working life has been spent in the Tourism industry, but her art has always been her true passion. Over the past couple of years she has begun to pursue it more seriously, completing a few commissioned portraits and displaying one of her works in a group exhibition Regional Artists and Local Talent, in Goulburn NSW in October 2010. This year she is commencing studies at TAFE, Illawarra Institute, in Visual Arts and Contemporary Crafts. Her dream and goal is to become a professional artist and she is working hard towards that dream.
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Anna Robertson
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
u This piece has come out of growing up with a firm tradition of a cup of tea punctuating all important gatherings and events in family life coupled with the warmth and welcome of the traditional Russian hostess. It is my belief that in our busy modern lives we may have lost the healing art of lending an ear over a cuppa.
Tea Lady Winterstone, 53x49x31cm, 2011, $980
Born of Russian ĂŠmigrĂŠ parents, Anna came to Australia in 1949. Now a mother and grandmother, she has worked as a secretary, primary teacher, family services co-ordinator and pastoral counsellor before taking up sculpture. Anna is currently resident sculptor and assistant teacher at Bayside Sculpture in Highett, Victoria, where she also creates her own works. An enthusiastic learner, Anna has taken a number of opportunities to study various forms of sculpture-making: most notably a stint carving marble in Carrara, Italy. Working in various media, Anna is developing her practice and has works in private collections in New York and Australia.
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Debbie Robinson CITY OF HOBSONS BAY
Enter the Dawn, Oil on canvas, 96 x 106cm, 2010, $2400
I have a love of figure painting with a particular focus on the figure in nature. I enjoy placing realistic three dimensional figures within a skewed landscape that often contains flat areas of pattern and stacked compositional elements. Thematically, my work concerns ritual and the search for paradise, contrasted
with notions of ‘paradise lost’ through the representation of the industrial landscape and the shadows cast by industry and modern life. The realisation of paradise is achieved through spiritual reconnection with the landscape, in finding purpose, identity and inspiration in nature and rediscovering our primitive selves.
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Debbie began art studies in Canada at the Alberta College of Art where she was awarded the Continuing Arts Foundation Scholarship. She then studied intaglio printmaking and Renaissance art history in Italy before migrating to Australia to complete a fine arts degree in Painting at RMIT. She is currently completing her Masters of Art Curatorship at Melbourne University.
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Emma Rochester
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
Sitting Above The Road (detail) Upholstery Weight Cotton, Wires, Cotton, 37x30x18cm, 2010, $7250
n The feminine experience as a way of understanding place has been lost over the centuries and in its place a complex system of mapping was developed. Cartography became formalised, accurate, exact, unquestionable in some cases; easier to understand than the place itself. The corset represents the notion of being bound, and wrapped in the social, cultural and historical norms which influence our way of seeing and describing place. This piece documents an earthmover as the driver takes a load from one site to the other. It is a mark making experience that looks at the shifting of dirt from here to there.
Emma completed a Bachelor of Fine Art in Drawing with First Class Honours in Media Arts at RMIT in 2010. Her cartographic art practice is an exploration of the sensory experience of place from a feminine perspective. She begins by holding pen to paper and as a result a line drawing emerges that indicates the movement felt and the journey made. This drawing is then scanned and taken into Photoshop where it is manipulated over and over again to make a pattern that is then printed onto upholstery weight cotton and made into a corset. Emma has been commissioned by the City of Melbourne to map The Dockland’s public berths for 2011 and to create four public drawing works.
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D.M. Ross CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
Industrial, Oil on canvas, 100 x 150cm, 2010, $2400
David Martin Ross has been a resident of St Kilda and inner suburban Melbourne for most of his life. He is a self-taught artist who painted purely for his own gratification for many years. He has a limited exhibition history, except for on the world wide web, which has provided international exposure and sales in recent years. This has given him the confidence to actively pursue showing his work in public. More of his paintings can be viewed at www.dmross.net
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Although I have no formal art education or training, I have been painting on and off for many years. My love of the analytical style and beauty of Cubism has driven me to pursue my own interpretation of this genre. To date I have rarely exhibited publicly and rely on my web site to display work. This has enabled me to be seen internationally and has led to collectors in Japan, USA, Europe, the Middle East and within Australia, purchasing and commissioning many pieces. This piece is a reaction to driving through the industrial inner West of Melbourne.
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Jack Rowland
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
t Through the use of surreal and hyper-real colour schemes, I aim to alter our perception of the landscape and reconsider our relationship with the land. As the natural world is becoming of greater importance in contemporary society, I believe a spiritual connection to nature is necessary as well as a change in psyche. In this piece, by using this surreal colour scheme, I aim to transform a familiar Australian landscape into an unfamiliar environment, thus evoking a somewhat strange and unsettling feeling for the viewer. Unfamiliar Oil on canvas, 150 x 120.5cm, 2010 $3500
Born in Melbourne, 1987, Jack has lived around the suburbs of Port Phillip for many years, including St. Kilda and Elwood. He is currently employed by the City of Port Phillip Council, based at the St. Kilda Town Hall. Jack completed his Bachelor of Fine Arts – Painting at RMIT and was awarded the Hotel Tolarno acquisitive art award at his graduate exhibition. Since then he has participated in many group exhibitions including ‘Exploration 10’, which is an annual emerging artist exhibition held at Flinders Lane Gallery. Currently, he continues to develop his hyper-real landscapes in his studio in Richmond.
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Sarah Schembri GUEST (VIC) REPRESENTED BY Potier
Orbital Dance, Ceramic, 10x13x10cm, 2009, $400
I draw inspiration from everything around me nature, people, the Australian landscape and my fascination with the mysteries of the universe. The evolution of the universe from its creation through to the discoveries of modern stellar exploration intrigues me enormously. The cycle of birth, growth,
death and rebirth is replicated on universal, planetary and human scales - “a divine symmetry”. My porcelain vessel was created with the cauldron of Jupiter’s surface in mind - the birth, growth and death of its storms. The symmetry of this cycle is a metaphor for life itself.
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Sarah was born in 1972 in Melbourne and currently lives in Geelong. She first became interested in Ceramics in 2002, however it wasn’t until 2006 that she decided to take it more seriously, studying part time at Holmesglen TAFE for a Diploma in Ceramics. She completed her final year at Ballarat University in 2010 and in December obtained a working studio space in North Melbourne which she shares with 13 other ceramic artists. In the past year she has also focussed on creating work for galleries and exhibitions.
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Robert Scholten
CITY OF PORT PHILLIP
o I examine how images affect contemporary culture, drawing inspiration and creating work in several disciplines. Having completed studies in graphic design as well as painting, photography and printmaking, I create work that fits the categories of illustration, fine art, comics and design. Each influences the other, and they all work in harmony to broaden an understanding of how we relate to images. My art encompasses a world of realism tinged with the fantastic; a desire to integrate the extremes of human experience: the sublime and the profane, reality and the immaterial, the inner and the outer, like fragments of existence sewn together by the experience of the individual.
Knitting Ink and digital colour – Giclee print on archival paper Limited edition of 75. 50 x 40cm, 2010, $150
Robert completed his Masters of Fine Arts at RMIT in 2009 and holds studio space at Studio 106 in St Kilda. A major influence on his work is his multi-cultural life. His parentage is Dutch-Filipino and his wife is JapaneseAmerican. He lived in Japan for a year, as well as travelling to other places such as New York City and Vietnam, all factors that lead him to intuitively layer cultural values, imagery and ideas within his art practice.
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Ema Shin GUEST (VIC)
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My Garden (Head 6) Woodblock print, collage, digital print, embroidery, paper & fabric Non-editioned mixed media work 72 x 48cm, 2010, $1400
I combine invisible emotional and physical aspects of humanity with visually recognizable shapes of plant life and human forms in a mixed media approach that uses organic materials and natural processes. Using traditional Japanese water base wood block printing, handmade Asian papers, raw fabric such as hemp and cotton combined with drawing, stitching and embroidery I am attempting to break the conventional boundaries and perceptions of printmaking.
Ema is a Japanese contemporary artist who established a studio practice in Melbourne in 2009. Her university undergraduate study at Tama Art University, Tokyo was in traditional Japanese printmaking. She completed a Master of Fine Art at Aichi Prefectural Art University, Nagoya, making contemporary art using a combination of traditional Japanese materials and techniques. After graduation, she established an art practice in Niigata prefecture exhibiting in Tokyo, Nagoya and Niigata as well as in numerous overseas group exhibitions. At this same time she also participated in overseas artist-in-residency and teaching projects in Japan, Mexico, Spain and Kenya.
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James Tapscott
GUEST (VIC)
Transmission Field – Desert at Dusk (Edition of 5, 2 available), C-type print, 70 x 110cm, 2009, $1600
My current body of work explores the link between matter and energy, a fusion of subjective and objective reality, and the effect our perception has on the world around us. Seeing how the work interacts with the energy of the space creates a collaboration between myself and the environment, directing the work through its evolution to its most effective
state. I have lately been exploring a process of leaving the works at their site for some time, allowing the energy of the site to become a defining factor in the result. My practice seeks to be energy efficient and environmentally sensitive. It exists in time, perhaps more than in space, and lives on through its documentation; like the memory of an event.
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After a gradual departure from painting some 4 years ago, James began creating light installations that work with the environment. Nature has now become his studio. His practice is influenced by artists like Robert Irwin and James Turrell and revolves around a process of research (of materials and locations) and then creating and evolving the piece as it is installed in specific locations.
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Daisy Watkins-Harvey CITY OF HOBSONS BAY
x Diverging from the reality on which it is modelled, this work attempts to penetrate the borderline between the everyday and the unknown.
A Pocket Full of Posies (Edition 2/5) Pigment print, 100 x 100cm, 2009/10, POA
Born and raised in Williamstown, Daisy completed a Bachelor of Fine Art (Honors) at RMIT University, during which time she undertook a semester abroad at the School of the Art Institute Chicago. Since graduating she has been employed as a Creative Assistant on various sculptural commissions for Universal Studios. Her work has been exhibited at various galleries in Melbourne, and at the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, where she was a shortlisted finalist in the National Youth Self Portrait Prize. She intends to undertake Artist Residencies in both Canada and the U.S.A throughout 2011/12.
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Michelle Watson
GUEST (VIC) REPRESENTED BY Catherine Asquith Gallery
Ascension, Gouache on paper, 83 x 103cm, 2010, $2300
My imagery exists in a perpetual dreamscape, a silent film that stops every so often to create a visual still. The ongoing narrative is essentially linked to both past and present- a deliberately fabricated break down of historical time intended to reveal the threads or links that exist between our society and societies of the past. I am examining the concept of facade, what lies
beyond and what lurks beneath. Visual conventions employed are intentionally seductive in the use of dramatic lighting, colour and an attention to detail but are utilized to create a push/ pull relationship. Character types are presented to construct an allegorical anecdote that questions the cultural narrative of our time and reveals a more ominous account of moral decline and anxiety.
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Michelle has worked full time as an arts educator for the past 20 years, with her own artistic practice limited to time spent in the studio after hours. Through extensive reading and research she has become focussed on aspects of human behaviour, personality, psychological motivation and specific cultural beliefs - both current and outmoded. She is intrinsically fascinated by Georgian and Victorian poetry, sentimentality and mourning culture. Her works consistently make reference to the symbology of this period- linking the past to the present.
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Dominique Wylestone CITY OF HOBSONS BAY REPRESENTED BY Outre Gallery
u As a young child I grew up with old books from my mother and grandmother. These books were filled with pictures, created from two basic elements black ink on white paper. Every time I looked at them they filled my head with a sense of wonder, and they still do to this day. This quote by William Saroyan sums up my thoughts. “In the time of your life, live, so in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite delight and mystery of it”. The Threshold, Edition 11/15 Drypoint print, 70 x 57cm, 2010, $695 framed
Dominique grew up in Williamstown and still lives and works in the inner west of Melbourne. She has a fondness and appreciation of local history, place and folklore. Her themes include daydreaming, journeying, dressing-up and anthropomorphised characters such as foxes, dogs and birds. Her taste for folk art is evident in her use of floral emblems, decorative dresses, storybook references and detail. ln the tradition of the Brothers Grimm, Dominique infuses her world of sweetness and play with an edge of darkness and foreboding. She loves hanging out in the Williamstown Botanical Gardens with her dog Heide and flipping vinyl platters when she’s in the mood for some tunes. Gemma Jones, Outre Gallery
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Jack Wylestone
CITY OF HOBSONS BAY
s The intimate and immediate nature of hand forging steel imbues the work with a vitality that I find both honest and exciting. The material, transformed by intense heat and pressure applied directly with hand tools, develops rich tones and textures, which facilitate connection with the work. The object, itself symbolic in both form and projected function, offers a physicality, a tether for that which is fleeting and elusive in contemporary life.
Heart, Forged mild steel, 17x30x8cm, 2010, $2400
Labyrinth, Forged mild steel, 11x16x10cm, 2010, $1800
Garden Forged mild steel, 21x16x10cm, 2010, $1800
Jack lives and works in Williamstown. He was apprenticed to Austrian born Artist Blacksmith Josef Balog in 1988, completing his formal training as a blacksmith in 1992. Although predominately employed in more contemporary fields of metalwork, he has increasingly utilized the elemental techniques and purist methodology of hand forging iron as an expressive medium.
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Sales Enquiries
Sales enquiries for any of the works in the catalogue can be made by contacting the curator Ken Wong on 0419 570 846
If you are interested in becoming involved in the Toyota Community Spirit Gallery program or wish to be added to our mailing list to be kept informed of upcoming events, email info@watcharts.com.au or visit www.watcharts.com.au/toyota.html or phone 03 58214548. IMAGE: Ascenstion by Michelle Watson Gouache on paper, 2010