Grapple 2002 -2003 Artists Page

grapple + curators essay + list of works + the galleries + recollections

Artists
Ross Barber Image translucent Braille tablet

The Rope, a reply to Charles Baudelaire and Edouard Manet, is part of a body of work I have been making since 1990 on the suicide hanging of Edouard Manet's assistant in the studio closet in 1859. Initially the work appeared as works on and in cast paper and as a written reply to Baudelaire’s La Cord. For Grapple this work has a resonance with an ongoing approach to my installation work that invites different viewers or readers if you prefer. The work has evolved into a recorded sound track and a series of 8 cast translucent tablets with an embedded piece of silk cord and bearing the story in braille, brightly lit on transparent plinths.
The lighting is set up to over–light the objects so much that the visual viewer has difficulty perceiving the work because of that excessive brightness. This simply challenges the visual reader’s primacy in the visual arts space. The embedded rope fragment is distorted for the visual reader who looks more closely at the work, but encounters an effect something like having cataracts, which continues to subvert visual perception. At the same time there will be a formal consistency in the work that will be aesthetically a contradiction, a reflective beauty.
The braille tablets give the braille reader a layer of the work that is a direct entry to the reply via touch but not entirely complete either. They will get the mother’s story only and a history lesson. And the listener will have to listen carefully as the dialogue continues in fragments of contesting views. Only in one part does Manet reflect on his actions but this is part of my further speculation on the story and the ongoing work. So, no reader of the work is really privileged above the other. As with any reading only an imperfect view is possible.

Sebastian Di Mauro

These artworks revolve around touch. The use of the materials is central to the decoding of the sculptures. Each of the artworks explore the close relationship between people and nature.
I have used carpet underlay in my works since the early 1990s. Carpet underlay is manufactured from jute, hence it is a natural and organic fibre. It is placed beneath carpet to cushion and protect, and in these sculptures acts as a metaphor to signify the extraordinary which is hidden beneath the surface.
Stainless steel pot scourers are used to clean and remove grime. The notion of cleansing is particularly significant and signifies the concept of cleansing the soul. The wiry looking yet soft to the touch pot scourers convey a dynamic sensual and visual quality.
Astroturf is an attempt by humans to copy and replicate nature. The irrepressible human desire to replicate and improve on natural forms is a key theme to these two artworks. It also alludes to the Australian time–honoured weekend pastime of lawn mowing as well as to the traditional European art of topiary, which has been embraced by many Australian gardeners in the pursuit of a manicured, formal garden.
For me, art needs to directly relate to everyday life. Much of the artwork I produce includes the use of ready–made household and commercial products. I am interested in the process of the transformation of ordinary materials and objects into something poetic and metaphoric. The power of this sculpture lies in its ability to transport the viewer beyond the ordinary into the extraordinary.

Ryan Dunshea

Thread is based upon the Incan system of Quipu, a decimal system represented by knots. The quantity of knots and their positioning on the strand denoted a particular numerical value, and strung together formed clerical records. The Quipu as an indigenous tactile text system is comparable to the Bulli in Ancient Mesopotamia where markings on clay pieces denoted agricultural indices and values.
The three objects exhibited here in Grapple do not just replicate this Incan system, but also reference the natural world of waterfalls, webs etc. The objects become organic within the gallery. Thread is intended as an evocative title, referencing the tracing of history, the methodologies of knot making, the action of the audience interacting with the work.
Thread has evolved from my ongoing interest in texts based on tactile or physical systems. Previous projects have included braille, images of sign language, and raised tactile surfaces. The Trace exhibition, created in collaboration with members of the Royal Blind Society of NSW, was part of the 2000 Sydney Paralympic Arts Festival at Object Galleries, and investigated the history of tactile communication systems that rivalled or were the contemporaries of braille.
The three pieces in this exhibition continue my interest in creating artworks that include a tactile element – artworks that break the invisible barriers of the gallery. My work is not just to be looked at but to be felt. The audience is encouraged to throw away the DO NOT TOUCH sign and play.

Candace Miles

My experiences with reef and sea environments have formed the central theme to my art practice - the textures, sights, sounds, smells and tastes become an integral part of my life and my artwork.
I have deliberately restricted my work for the Grapple exhibition to the sole form of the starfish. I have also excluded the use of colour and concentrated on texture, tone and contrast. These are restrictions known by many people who have vision impairment. As a sighted artist, however, the visual cannot be ignored - the high contrast of blacks, whites, greys and glittering silvers is intended to dramatise and attract attention, as does the use of multiples of a theme.
The choice of the starfish is metaphorical in more than one aspect. These sea creatures have no dependence on vision – they have no eyes to see, so they must rely on other senses. Texture is very much a part of the sea creature and by using a variety of materials to portray different texture, the intention is to evoke interest and invite tactile experience.
Even though starfish can have numerous limbs, it is the star shape that is its most recognised form. This star symbol is synonymous with the five-point shape of the celestial star. The concept of the work is also symbolised by the celestial star – seen as untouchable – which is associated with well known adages such as to "reach for the stars". It has implications of extending oneself beyond the norm and to strive to reach further. I have changed the name from sea to see, meaning that by using the sense of touch these stars will be ‘seen’ more clearly with the hands.

Christine Prescott

I create using a recipe of taste, touch and smell.
My practice is grounded in process, each element containing a memory specific to the work.
It is a weak attempt to deny the inevitability of decay as we forget and forge our own memories, reconstructing our existence.
To the memory, smell is the most faithful of the senses.
This work has crafted its dialogue from scents; it is at once metaphysical, medical and poetic.

With a horn
retrieved from my jingling pockets
I construct methodologies of hope.
Works are absent,
leaving the form to make love
to my linguistic mind.
Holds me lost and salty.
I can hear that nothing.
It knows what I want and teases
the tip of my tongue.
b "It has always spoken, it will always speak of things that don’t exist, or only exist elsewhere."
W "My mouth on yours forms words I do not know."
b "My mouth it wouldn’t have much to say."
W "The word and the kiss are one."
b "Yes, I was never silent, whatever I said I was never silent."
W "Delicate words. Words of the spirit forced into flesh."
I put the words into a flask and flung them in the sea.
imaginary dialogue between the words of Jeanette Winterson and Samuel Beckett

Alan Valentine

Sea gongs are sound sculptures that first appeared at the 2001 Strand Ephemera exhibition in Townsville. They are round–bodied five legged animals capped with steel discs and central plungers that invite intellectual, visual, tactile and aural stimulation in response to the form and function. To operate a sea gong all that needs to be done is to push the plunger or big button down to hear its bell like sound.
An invitation to touch and operate these sculptures along with the suggestion they might actually do something has proven to be popular amongst all types of people of all ages. The cool and warm surfaces, bumps and hollows combined with the sound and the sensation felt when touching the vibrating metal, are experiences that seeing without touching could never fully perceive.
Unlike earlier inter–active sounding sculptures that emphasised the mechanics and the relatively straight lines and toughness of Australian building hardwood, the Sea gongs evolved into a distinct organic/ mechanical form with the intention they be complementary to the landscaped foreshore of Townsville’s Strand.
As these sculptures were designed for unsupervised public inter–action, safety was a major consideration as was vandalism. This demanded a concealed mechanism for sounding the sculpture and a very robust construction method that would withstand the rigors of being jumped on. Some of these design constraints actually helped enhance the overall form; an example being the necessity to overlap the carved components to create a robust structure.
The making of these sculptures was most rewarding. Carving the multiple configurations of five hardwood segments and five legs for the construction of each piece required extensive use of hand tools such as a wood rasp, files and sand paper and of course, the most important tool of all, the sense of touch.

Stephen Weis

The Soaring Sole Toneaphone is a toy with the inherent potential of an instrument.
The interactive experience is my primary concern. Any apparent commentary on the world at large is in the perception rather than the intention.
These days my work is composed principally of discarded, waste or rejected materials that are reincarnated into a context far from their origins. They find their way into the sculpture through their sense of collusion with the mystique rather than through rational constructs.
I use the creative process as a personal gestalt, both to uncover unconscious sensation and also to promote aspects of "self" through symbolic gesture. This process employs conscious actions as well as a high level of intuitive activity deeper than reasoning.
During the past four or five years my work has been concerned primarily with considerations of the "unknowable" as opposed to the alliteration of the "known". In this sense I work in creative "openness" without attachment to conceptual planning.
The sense of vibration is primary to my process. While I maintain a perception of light and sound as vibration, I include and often focus more specifically on my intuitive and instinctive vibrational responses to the products of daily life. They are often chosen for their challenging aspect as opposed to their ease of inclusion.
Tensions and harmonies evolve from the juxtaposition and interrelation of formerly irrelevant components. Through such tensions in their varied forms, I seek animation in both context and engagement. They bring to the work the receiving and expressing faculties. The sculpture absorbs stimulus and responds in its own language.
This enables a dialogue that is not entirely predictable. This, for me at this time, emulates my experience of life in all its unpredictable glory.

Liz Woods

I first became fascinated by smell as an undergraduate student. It was suggested that I read the book Perfume by Peter Suskind. This has subsequently become an area of investigation for me over the last 12 years – what is smell and why do we all smell and react to olfactory senses differently?
Throughout the course of our everyday life we encounter a wide variety of olfactory senses. These senses unwittingly help us to explore the deeper socio-economic issues of our society.
Smell informs us, smell reminds us, smell pleasures us, smell cautions us.
In the psycho–semiology of olfaction we organise our olfactory sense to caution us. We can smell protection, love, hate, death, and filth.
We smell before we see.
Some people smell what other people do not. People find happiness in smell that others find repulsive. It is at this point that we begin to research the social aspects of smell. We all smell differently, however, with the urbanisation of olfactory we have come to depend on deodorants, perfumes, soap powders etc. and we all begin to smell alike. The semiology of olfactory can trick us.
So can the olfactory be trusted?
Can the visual be trusted?
What do you see?
What do you smell?

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