PETER CALLAS IN SURVEY OF AUSTRALIAN VIDEO ART

PETER CALLAS is featured in Cognitive Dissidents: Reasons to be Cheerful, now open at Griffith University Art Museum. The exhibition examines the experimental practices central to the development of the video medium in Australian from the 1970s to the 1990s.

"Throughout the 1980s and 1990s Callas' work was often cited as a paradigm case of 'postmodern aesthetics' whereby video and digital technologies provided a means for the rapid, freewheeling interrelation of all kinds of imagery; this was supposedly aid and abet the developments of that shrinking, borderless, increasingly multicultural, globe. And it's easy to see how Callas' videos embody this potential, as they set in train elements drawn from various cultures, side-by-side, overlapping, fast and furious throbbing montage. Callas himself cites Japanese advertising as the protean form of this burgeoning aesthetic..."

- Stuart Koop, 2002

The exhibition continues until 9 April. 

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GUAN WEI: A CASE STUDY

Guan Wei, Salvation No.1, 2015, bronze, 33 x 19 x 32 cm

The MAC (Museum of Art & Culture Lake Macquarie) has just opened Guan Wei: A Case Study - an exhibition of Guan Wei's work with an accompanying case-study publication geared specifically towards Year 12 Visual Arts students. 

The exhibition runs until 5 April. 

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DANI MARTI AT MUSAC

Dani Marti, The Stamp Collector [cropped video still], 2007, video 6’40min

DANI MARTI's work The Stamp Collector is part of the exhibition Five itineraries with a point of view at MUSAC (Museum of Contemporary Art of Castilla y León). This exhibition celebrates the 15th anniversary of MUSAC and explores five themes that have guided the museum's acquisitions and programming since 2013.

In this video work we see a close-up of a man in a leather suit engaging in a chat exchange. The character remains anonymous - we hear only the sound of the keyboard and see the screen reflected in his glasses. Conflating the genres of portraiture and social documentary, the work displays many of the defining features on Marti's video practice - constrained scale, focus on the body and an intense concentration on an everyday scenario. "I call them portraits as a starting point, as a reference...but these portraits go beyond the person being portrayed - the individuals are just vehicles for something else. It is a search for some kind of abstraction, or maybe you could call it emotion," says Marti.

The exhibition at MUSAC runs until 7 June. 

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EUGENIA RASKOPOULOS WORK IN VENICE

Eugenia Raskopoulos, Rootreroot [video still], 2016, HD digital video, single channel, colour, stereo, 8:45 min;

EUGENIA RASKOPOULOS is exhibiting 'Rootreroot' in 'The Body Language', an international exhibition at THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space in Venice. 

In this video work, the artist is filmed from above as she drags an olive tree clockwise is the upper section, and a wattle tree anticlockwise below. Where the circles fleetingly intersect, we glimpse a moment of completeness between Raskopoulos' Greek & Australian identities. "Whether gestures are recorded or photographed, my body becomes a means for mark-making during performative acts that involve translation, transformation and fragmentation," says the artist. 

The exhibition continues until 12 March.

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PAT BRASSINGTON AT MGA

Pat Brassington, Untitled VII , 1980–2002, printed 2010, pigment ink-jet print, 370 x 249 mm

PAT BRASSINGTON has three works featured in the exhibition Dressing up: clothing and camera, closing soon at the Monash Gallery of Art (MGA).

This exhibition draws together photographs from the MGA collection that feature dress or clothing as a significant element in their making

The exhibition will close this Sunday 9 February.

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PETER DAVERINGTON COMPLETES MURAL IN SOUTH MELBOURNE

PETER DAVERINGTON has completed a large-scale mural at South Melbourne Primary School, the first public vertical school in Victoria.

Featuring an Australian landscape of banksias and verdant growth interrupted by geometric, hard-edge line work continued from the building's facade, the mural will be enjoyed by students for years to come.

Watch Peter at work in the footage captured by Danny Ronin here.

Peter Daverington, Coxsakie mural, 2019, South Melbourne Primary School, Victoria.

JOHN YOUNG AWARDED ORDER OF AUSTRALIA

A huge congratulations to JOHN YOUNG AM, who last week became a member of the Order of Australia. John has been recognised for his significant service to the visual arts, and as a role model.

Since his first exhibition in 1979, Young has had more than 70 solo exhibitions and over 160 group exhibitions nationally and internationally. He has devoted a large part of his four-decade career towards regional development in Asia, and recently focused his work on transcultural humanitarianism. Young was seminal in establishing the Asian Australian Artists’ Association (Gallery 4A) in 1995, now 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, where he has been a board member since 2009. Young was also a lecturer in painting at University of Sydney, Sydney College of the Arts has undertaken residencies and fellowships with the Australia Council for the Arts and is a trustee of McClelland Sculpture Park+Gallery.

As evidenced by the career highlights above, this is truely a well-deserved achievement. Congratulations John!

ART AUCTION FOR BUSHFIRE RELIEF

ARC ONE artists JANET LAURENCE, HONEY LONG & PRUE STENT, NIKE SAVVAS and ANNE ZAHALKA are among sixty leading contemporary artists who are working in solidarity to raise funds for the Australian bushfire crisis.

On Wednesday 12 February, the National Art School will host a silent art auction event. Raised funds will be donated to nominated charities The Climate Council, Firesticks Alliance Network and WWF Australia.

The artworks for sale can be previewed now via the Home Bushfire Relief website.

Live auction on 12 February from 7-10pm. Register your attendance here!

JANET LAURENCE AT ‘NUIT DES IDÉES’

Janet speaking at the opening of Continuous Regeneration in Shanghai.

JANET LAURENCE will join a panel of artists and scientists for La Nuit des Idées (Night of Ideas) at the Sydney Opera House this Thursday 30 January.

Founded five years ago in Paris, La Nuit des Idées has grown into a global celebration of arts, culture, science and philosophy. In 2020, for the first time, Sydney will be part of this international festival. The theme "Being Alive" promises vibrant, cross-cultural and interdisciplinary conversation about life and the universe.

Janet will be joined by Dr Thierry Hoquet, Professor of Philosophy of Science, writer Olivia Rosenthal, composer Eryck Abecassis, artist Richard Bell & academic Karlie Noon. 

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CATHERINE WOO’S FACADE FOR THE RITZ CARLTON

Catherine Woo has created a facade for the newly developed Ritz-Carlton hotel in Perth. Her work titled Cascade was designed to evoke shimmering water, referencing the nearby Swan River and the falling water of the famous Kimberley Gorges of Western Australia. 

Woo's original work was scanned into a 3D model and developed at monumental scale using virtual reality technology. Cast in recycled aluminium, the rippling surface comes to life under the changing light of day and creates a powerful physical presence through scale and reflection. 

Built by UAP in collaboration with the artist and the construction team at ProBuild.

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Photos by Robert Frith - Acorn Photo.

ANNE ZAHALKA

Anne Zahalka, installation view of Wild Life, Australia at ARC ONE Gallery, 2019 featuring Sea Bird Colony, Admiralty Rocks with turbulent seas, Lord Howe Island, 2019, pigment ink on adhesive paper, 275 x 375 cm (Source: Australian Museum)

ANNE ZAHALKA is featured in the exhibition Sublime Sea: Rapture & Reality at the Mornington Peninsula Gallery, opening this Saturday 14th December.

The exhibition is a spectacular immersive exhibition about the power of the sea in human imagination. It combines art and the natural sciences to chart the evolution of a ‘sublime’ perception of nature and the sea’s benevolence as a primal source of life. Contemporary works reflect new realities and insights into human interaction with the sea, the tragic voyages of refugees, threat of plastic pollution and alienation from natural forces.

The exhibition continues until 23 February.

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CYRUS TANG

CYRUS TANG's solo exhibition Golden Hour, previously shown at ARC ONE in 2018, is being exhibited at Galerie Oasis in Bangkok.

Opening today, this exhibition comprises a suite of photographic works that continue Tang's project of paradoxically reconstructing and recording ephemeral mental images and sensations in permanent materials. The title is inspired by the multiple meanings of the term 'Golden Hour' - sometimes referring to the narrow margin of time for treating casualty patients in trauma yet also used by photographers to refer to a brief moment of time just before sunset or just after sunrise.

The exhibition continues until 12 January.

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CYRUS TANG

Cyrus Tang, still from Remote Nation, 2008, standard definition video loop, 13.56 min

CYRUS TANG’s work Remote Nation is currently showing at MS.SUE as part of the exhibition EVERYTHING THAT EXISTS IN THE CURRENT.

The exhibition, part of the Due West Festival program, explores the emotional and social implications of moving between different states of being. When the flow of our existence is interrupted and relocated, the context shifts, and everything we knew then is no longer.

Tang’s video work Remote Nation shows a city made of clay gradually disintegrating underwater, thereby alluding to a fading sense of 'home'. The water, however, transforms the city into another state of existence. Tang says she is particularly moved by the residue left from the melted clay.

Curated by Nikki Lam, EVERYTHING THAT EXISTS IN THE CURRENT is installed at multiple sites in central Footscray.

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JANET LAURENCE

Janet Laurence’s installation at Continuous Regeneration

JANET LAURENCE is exhibiting a version of 'Desire, Elixir Lab' at Columbia Circle in Shanghai. Continuous Regeneration, an exhibition on sustainability, sees 30 world-renowned artists and designers address the issue of environmental protection.

Columbia Circle is a historical compound built in the 1920s during Shanghai's grand epoch. It used to house, among other things, the Columbia Country Club, a popular hangout for the American elite society in the ‘30s & ‘40s including a clubhouse, gym and outdoor pool. Having sat vacant for years, the site is now being renewed by OMA Architecture and is fast becoming a prominent public space in Shanghai again, full of commercial and cultural activities, restaurants and creative business.

Continuous Regeneration is an exhibition committed to creating an organic and interactive space to deeply explore the environmental and ecological issues facing the world today, with the hope of triggering public concern and action.

The exhibition will run until 16 February.

LYNDELL BROWN & CHARLES GREEN

Charles Green & Lyndell Brown with one of their works on display in Civilization: The Way We Live Now at NGV Australia.

LYNDELL BROWN & CHARLES GREEN are featured in the latest edition of NGV magazine. In an edited transcript of a conversation that took place in April this year, Charles & Lyndell discuss the role of artists on war missions and their experiences in wartime.

LB: Our works are what you could call ‘slow art’. They are often finely worked, detailed realist paintings, and they take us a long time to do in the studio. We weren’t keen on the idea of working like that in difficult situations. We were in the desert conditions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

CG: We were possibly the first Australian official war artists to resist the idea of painting and drawing on the spot. It’s an immensely complicated process to get artists into those zones and a place where they can work. We. told them we could go in with cameras

Read the full article here >

JOHN DAVIS

John Davis, Kōan 64, 1994, twigs, calico, bituminous paint, cotton thread, 2378 x 150 x 7 cm.

JOHN DAVIS' work Kōan 64 has been acquired by the Geelong Gallery and will be on display among other recent acquisitions in their show Turmoil & Tranquility - recent acquisitions 2018-19, opening this weekend.

Davis' mature works are a distillation of many of his earlier explorations. While still characterised by the use of inexpensive or found materials and low-technology processes, and reflecting his affinity with the Australian bush, works such as this one present a philosophical perspective and a deeper concern for the state of the world.

The title of the work draws upon the Zen Buddhist concept of Kōan. Eluding a precise definition, the term loosely identities that which cannot be understood through rational thought but might be accessible through intuition. Arguably, for Davis, it articulated that indeterminate space between absence and presence.

Turmoil & Tranquility will run until 16 February.

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JANET LAURENCE

Regenerative farmer Rebecca Gorman & Janet Laurence at Yabtree West.

JANET LAURENCE is participating in a 'Farm & Art Open Day' at Yabtree West this Saturday 30 November.

Through the auspices of Earth Canvas, this unique project has invited 6 leading Australian landscape artists to devise a body of work that reflects their experience of working on a Regenerative Farm.

Janet undertook a residency in April with regenerative farmer Rebecca Gorman, at her property 'Yabtree West' in Gundagai NSW, which hosts a beautiful community of trees. On Saturday, guests will be able to see the resulting artwork and experience a day of tree immersion, discussions of regenerative agriculture, guided walks, artists talks and lunch from local producers.

This is a terrific reason to spend a day in the country, suitable for the whole family. Camping on the property, or local accommodation can also be arranged.

More information here>

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PAT BRASSINGTON

Pat Brassington, The Permissions #4, 2013, pigment print, 21 x 18 cm

PAT BRASSINGTON's work is on show in the exhibition 'Contemporising the Modern: Australian Modern & Contemporary Photography', now showing at Town Hall Gallery, Hawthorn.

Showcasing photographic works that speak of 20th- and 21st-century Australia, this exhibition explores the development of Australian photography and its coming of age in a period when photographers were still pushing for their work to be accepted as a pure art form. The works are drawn from the Russell Mills Collection and are touring from MAMA (Murray Art Museum Albury).

The exhibition runs until 15 December.

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JOHN YOUNG

John Young, Lambing Flat Riots installation view within The Lives of Celestials exhibition at Boroondarra Arts Centre, 2019.

JOHN YOUNG is an exhibiting artist in the travelling show Don't Ask Me Where I'm From. The exhibition will open at the Imago Mundi's Gallerie delle Prigioni in Treviso, Italy, and will tour to the Aga Khan Museum in Toronto in March, before multiple venues across Canada, the US, Europe & the Middle East. 

The exhibition is born out of a new partnership between the Aga Khan Museum & the Luciano Benetton Foundation's Imago Mundi, dedicated to fostering dialogue and understanding between cultures and communities. Don't Ask Me Where I'm From channels the immigrant experience in a series of diverse artistic commissions exploring cross-cultural artistic realities.

John Young will present a version of the Lambing Flat Riots project. Between November 1860 and September 1861 the New South Wales goldfields of Burrangong, near the present day township of Young, was the site of Australia’s largest racially motivated riot. Rising antagonism over gold mining disparities and cultural habits saw trivial misunderstandings intensify into racial tensions that erupted into violence across the goldfields. Over 10 months, Chinese miners were subjected to threats, robbery and sustained acts of violence. This anti-Chinese sentiment had swept through the goldfields of Victoria in the 1850s and by the early 1860s had reached a flashpoint in New South Wales, provoking public opinion and debate. In Sydney, the NSW Parliament responded to the contention by passing legislation to restrict Chinese immigration and began, alongside Victoria and South Australia, to write the prelude to the White Australia Policy.

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JULIE RRAP

JULIE RRAP has put forward a proposal for the AGNSW facade commission. Julie was one of six women artists invited to create a concept for the empty space above the Gallery’s grand entrance, once intended for a decorative bronze panel that was never realised.

In 1913, the Gallery trustees commissioned the expatriate Australian artist Dora Ohlfsen (1869-1948) to sculpt a classical Greek chariot race in low relief for it. Though Ohlfsen worked on the piece for many years and her designs were approved, in 1919 the commission was abruptly cancelled. One hundred years later, the AGNSW is examining the original commission and some exciting contemporary proposals for the space.

In her concept, Rrap uses her own body to engage with issues of representation, gender and power.

Titled Walk out, Rrap’s panel appropriates the legs of five favourite sculptures in the AGNSW collection: those by Ugo Rondinone, Patricia Piccinini, Hans Bellmer, Louise Bourgeois & Michael Parekowhai. If developed further, Rrap would perform these figures, acting them out and casting her own legs in bronze.

In Walk out, Rrap uses surreal humour to destabilise. She refers to the relentless imaging of the body - especially the female body - within Western art history. These disembodied legs walk out in protest from the bastion of culture; or do they join our own to reenter the museum confidently, through the front door?

An exhibition of the proposed concepts runs until 8 March 2020.

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