Cloth in the Field of Gold
This series of paintings pursues concepts underlying culturally defined power roles, and the continually growing ways that identity is mediated in society including in cultural production. In the title work for this exhibition, the suit of armour worn by the figure has been inspired by the sculptural form of Australian artist Ron Robertson-Swann's public artwork 'The Vault' that is permanently situation adjacent to the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art in Melbourne.
This led me to developing a series of small collages that also consider the transformative capacity of art that transacts in the structures, places, and contexts where art is seen, such as public and commercial galleries, art auctions, monumental foyers, waiting rooms, the home, in catalogues, journals, in social media & the internet, and public spaces. These paintings also hope to generate a curiosity about the journey of the artwork and its role in cultural production, and its eventual migration from the possession of the artist to new locations and with that move is ordained with a specific function – to be viewed and therefore consequently consumed.
