This exhibition presents a selection of works as part of my Doctor of Visual Arts final assessment.
Over the past three years I have used practice-led research to analyse Eurocentric and anthropocentric ideologies about nature, tracing them back to the eighteenth century invasion and colonisation of Australia. Based on this research, I have created a series of unmonumental sculptural objects that address environmental issues and concerns in Australia. In these works, I explore the power of the visual metaphor offered by salvaged materials (what some might call ‘rubbish’), utilising two contrasting techniques. The first involves incorporating the qualities of trompe l’oeil, which I use as a form of mimetic critique. The second involves drawing upon a junk aesthetic that rejects orderly for disorderly, elaborate for informal, whereby I seek to reflect the dynamics of unmonumentality.
I have adopted a self-reflexive and interpretative approach, mindful of how I belong to a colonising culture. Drawing on decolonising methodologies, my work aims to question colonial history and to challenge dominant ideologies underpinning white Australian attitudes and practices towards the natural terrain. My purpose is to be open to new ways of thinking about the connection to land and self, initiated through the theoretical frameworks of ecological thought and ecofeminism which highlight different narratives and knowledge systems existing within Aboriginal and white Australian culture.
Location: POP Gallery, 381 Brunswick Street, Fortitude Valley, Brisbane.
