Artereal Gallery

Stay up to date... Follow us on our new website!

2016-02-01T11:30:00.000+11:00

To celebrate Artereal Gallery's 10 year anniversary, we are excited to launch our brand new website!

Moving forward we will be sharing our Artists' News and Gallery Milestones under the NEWS section of our updated website.

We have chosen to retain this blog as an archive of the first ten years of Artereal Gallery's history... But moving forward this blog will longer be updated.

Follow our news here and head over to the new website! www.artereal.com.au

CALL OUT FOR VOLUNTEERS TO ASSIST IN EMILY SANDRUSSI'S LATEST ART PROJECT...

2015-12-10T13:31:00.001+11:00

Call out for volunteers to take part in a contemporary art project!! Melbourne based artist Emily Sandrussi is currently looking for female volunteers to assist with a new body of work.

Working with a set of 1994 Encyclopaedia Britannica books (which the artist's mother gave her) Emily is assembling a group of 29 women to assist her in reading all 29 volumes - an act from which a series of artworks will be generated. For more information contact info@artereal.com.au

*Volunteers do not need to be based in Melbourne to participate in this project.

ANNE MACDONALD & ANDREW LAVERY // WHAT'S IN THE TOY BOX?

2015-12-09T15:11:00.002+11:00

Anne MacDonald_Cherish (kitty doll)_2010_Fine art inkjet print_Edition of 5_90 x 70cm

Anne MacDonald and Andrew Lavery have both been invited to participate in What's in the box?, a group exhibition at Goulburn Regional Art Gallery which runs from 27 November - 24 December 2015.

What's in the box? is an exhibition of works particularly for children but also suitable for adults in need of a little nostalgia in the lead up to Christmas.

Participating artists include: Hamilton Darroch, Troy Emery, Gordon Fitchett, Anna Glynn, Freya Jobbins, Andrew Lavery, Anne MacDonald, Alasdair Macintyre, Kendal Murray, Susan O'Doherty, Anna-Maria Sviatko, Hiromi Tango, Mike Worrall, Goulburn Regional Woodworkers Inc & more from the gallery collection.

LOUISE ZHANG // FROM OLD GROUND

2015-12-05T11:59:00.003+11:00

Louise Zhang_Here for more than a few moons (detail)_2015

Louise Zhang has been invited to participate in From Old Ground at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery.

Coinciding with the 2015 Bicentenary celebrations of the colonial settlement of Bathurst, From Old Ground commemorates the Central West region’s early Chinese migrant history and features the work of four Australian and Chinese artists, Jason Phu, Louise Zhang, Ren Hang and Jess Bradford.

Producing specially commissioned work spanning ink painting, installation, video and photography, each of the artists engages with the fragmented narratives and silent monuments of this important chapter in Bathurst’s social, cultural and economic history.

Louise Zhang_Here for more than a few moons (detail)_2015

Louise Zhang revisits the landscape of Golden Gully, located between Hill End and Tambaroora, where Chinese alluvial gold miners were particularly successful around the 1850s. Once a centre of social and economic activity, the landscape now lies dormant, with only subtle traces of Chinese miners’ circular shafts-silent monuments to the site’s past life.

Zhang recasts Golden Gully’s distinctive natural and human-made rock formations and orifices in acrylic paint, foam, plaster, polyurethane and resin. The fragments that result are presented as quasi-geological specimens, frozen in time yet bursting with the energy of a bygone era.

Louise Zhang_Here for more than a few moons (detail)_2015

Curator Joanna Bayndrian says: “This is a timely opportunity to uncover the lesser-known stories of a formative period in Australia’s history. These newly commissioned works focus on the remnant narratives of Chinese migration in the Central West. Collectively they actively shift the memory of the region’s Chinese heritage from the sideline, to the centre of public imagination. Importantly, From Old Ground acknowledges the historical depth of the cultural diversity that we celebrate today.”

From Old Ground has been funded by Museums & Galleries NSW’s Curatorial Support Initiative in partnership with 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney. The exhibition runs from 27 November 2015 until 24 January 2016.

FINALISTS // THE 64TH BLAKE PRIZE

2015-12-01T13:57:00.000+11:00

Liam Benson_The Crusaider_2015_Inkjet print on cotton rag paper_Edition of 5_90 x 134 cm

(Photographed by Alex Wisser)

Shoufay Derz_Someone digging in the ground (black) (left) & Someone digging in the ground (red) (right)_2015

Pigment print on cotton paper, custom frame stained eucalyptus and rust_Edition of 5_99 x 92cm

Congratulations to our artists Liam Benson, Shoufay Derz and Zan Wimberley on being selected as finalists in this year's Blake Prize.

"The 64th Blake Prize has three prize categories that challenge artists to investigate ideas, issues and engage audiences in conversations surrounding spiritual thought and religion in contemporary art. All the Blake Prize’s are strictly non-sectarian. The entries are not restricted to works related to any faith or any artistic style, but any work entered must have a recognisable religious or spiritual integrity.

From 2016, The Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre will deliver The Blake Prize as a biennial event into the future. Casula Powerhouse will maintain the guiding principles of The Blake Prize in continuing to engage contemporary artists, both national and international, in conversations concerning faith, spirituality, religion, hope, humanity, social justice, belief and non-belief. The Blake Prize is an aesthetic means of exploring the wider experience of spirituality and all this may entail with the visionary imagining of contemporary artists."

The winners will be announced on 12 February 2016.

To learn more about the Blake Prize, click here.

LOUISE ZHANG // #THETHINGSILOVE❤

2015-11-28T10:39:00.000+11:00

Image courtesy of Daniel Boud and Carriageworks

Louise Zhang was recently invited to participate in #TheThingsILove❤, a photographic project by Daniel Boud, commissioned by Carriageworks and BresicWhitney.

#TheThingsILove❤ celebrates the act of collecting - a universal fascination with art, objects, fashion, colour and history.

The project features the collections of Abdul Abdullah (artist), William Yang (artist), Penelope Seidler (architect), Deborah Sams and Mary Lou Ryan (of Bassike), Kylie Kwong (chef), Will Edwards (of Archie Rose), Elizabeth Tillman (of TEES), Rarriwuy Hick (actor), Louise Zhang (artist) and Julian Day (artist and journalist).

SYLVIA SCHWENK // Croydon International Film Festival and the 13th In the Palace International Short Film Festival

2015-11-27T10:30:00.000+11:00

Sylvia Schwenk, Water ways, (6 minute loop )

Congratulations to Sylvia Schwenk whose latest film Water ways will be screening at two film festivals over the coming weeks: the Croydon International Film Festival in London on 28 November 2015; and the 13th In the Palace International Short Film Festival in the National Palace of Culture, Sofia, Bulgaria, from 8 to 13 December 2015.

Water ways is a visual documentary that transports us into the lives of a community living on the rivers in Indonesia. The film shows a slice of everyday life, starting with a group of children playing in the wash of the boat; and a tangle of boats that ultimately leads us to the main protagonist of the film, an older woman who shares her point of view with us. This woman absorbs the details of life around her from the edge of a timber yard, as she completes her morning rituals. She takes us into her world, a textured and fascinating place that we are invited to experience.

Sylvia has also been invited to exhibit two of her films, A shared space and Sometimes awful things have their own kind of beauty as part of a group exhibition at Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre. Entitled Outer space and curated by Adam Porter, the exhibition utilises the idea of space as a metaphor to explore the limits and agency of the physical body and human existence within the physical environments.

A shared space is a visual documentary that gives a rare insight into what happens before and after a funeral service. The film opens on a graveyard on a beautiful serene sunny day. Grave diggers are working in a quiet, harmonious way preparing a grave for a burial. The birds are chirping, the sun is shining - but all is not as it seems.

Sometimes awful things have their own kind of beauty is a mesmerising film of a man the artist invited to perform in a maximum security prison. The man dances with a lawnmower to the music of a harrowingly beautiful waltz, in an area surrounded by perimeter fencing, alarmed fences, and razor wire.

Outer space will run from 5 December 2015 to 7 February 2016 at Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre.

SHOUFAY DERZ // IN CONVERSATION WITH NOULA DIAMANTOPOULOS & LINDY LEE

2015-11-26T10:08:00.000+11:00

Shoufay Derz_Someone digging in the ground (the hole)

2015_Pigment print on cotton paper, custom frame stained eucalyptus and rust_Edition of 5_99 x 92 cm

To coincide with her current solo exhibition The Wish, Shoufay Derz will sit down with fellow artists Lindy Lee and Noula Diamantopoulos, for a discussion on their individual practices and the role which doubt plays within the creative process.

DATE: Saturday 1 December 2015

TIME: 6pm drinks, 6:30pm panel talk

LOCATION: Artereal Gallery - 747 Darling St, Rozelle NSW 2039

This panel discussion will be followed by a brief meditation session.

YIORGO YIANNOPOULOS // 2015 ARTEREAL GALLERY MENTORSHIP AWARD

2015-11-25T10:34:00.000+11:00

Yiorgo Yiannopoulos_Belly Button_2015

Sydney College of the Arts (SCA) Bachelor of Visual Arts (Honours) student Yiorgo Yiannopoulos has won the 2015 Artereal Gallery Mentorship Award, presented at the opening of the 2015 SCA Undergraduate Degree Show on Tuesday 17 November.

The photomedia student received the award for his series of pigment prints entitled Checkmate. The series takes its name from the at-home infidelity test kit CheckMate, which is commonly used in forensics and used in this instance to create Yiannopoulos’ body of work.

Artereal Gallery’s Director and Owner, Luisa Catanzaro, said "For an emerging artist at such an early stage in his career, Yiorgo has produced a body of work which is both nuanced and conceptually sophisticated. We were particularly impressed with the way in which Yiorgo experiments with material and process as a means to communicate issues surrounding gay identity and the sexual topography of the body and the space in which it exists. There is a subtle tension between the poetic aesthetics of Yiorgo’s works, and the underlying politics of identity being explored within the work, which is intriguing and thought-provoking….”

Checkmate comprises two larger prints, Marketplace (before) and Marketplace (after), and six smaller prints titled Chin, Neck, Chest, Hand Towel, Belly Button and Black Briefs. Yiannopoulos’ art practice is focused on spaces that allow gay men to fulfil their desires, and to find intimacy in covert ways that often defy convention and have implications on identity and sexuality.

As the 2015 recipient of the Artereal Gallery Mentorship Award, Yiorgo will work closely with the Artereal Gallery team as part of a twelve month long mentorship program culminating in a solo exhibition in December 2016.

SHOUFAY DERZ // THE 4TH INTERNATIONAL NEW MEDIA FORUM

2015-11-22T17:23:00.000+11:00

Shoufay Derz_洗手 (xǐshǒu) Wash Hands_2015_Single channel video loop_Duration variable_Edition of 5

Shoufay Derz has been invited to present her work as part of the 4th International New Media Forum at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in Chongqing, China.

Coinciding with this symposium, Shoufay will be exhibiting her video work as part of The Fate of The Image, a group exhibition curated by Wang Chunchen from China Academy of Fine Arts Museum which runs from 25 November - 30 December 2015.

ARTEREAL GALLERY IS EXCITED TO ANNOUNCE THAT WE NOW REPRESENT BEN ALI ONG

2015-11-21T10:36:00.000+11:00

Ben Ali Ong_Nyctophilia 13_2015_Archival inkjet pigment print_Edition of 3_29.5 x 37 cm

Artereal Gallery is excited to announce that we are now representing Ben Ali Ong. Ben Ali Ong is a Sydney based artist working predominantly across photography, video and mixed media. Choosing to work solely in black and white, his brooding photographs are defined by their use of dream-like imagery and explore recurring universal themes - life and death, the poetics of every-day existence, the pain and suffering of the human condition contrasted with the beauty and mystery of the urban environment and the natural world.

Often blurry, grainy and scratched – Ong’s pictorial choices appear to be made completely at random, creating a disjointed and surreal narrative... Preferring the artworks to speak for themselves, Ong presents them in a manner that allows the viewer to construct their own meanings and interpretations, in order to achieve a state of self-reflection. This idea is concurrent throughout all of Ong’s works and is inspired by Surrealist film and writing. The notion of the artwork being an open-ended fragment with multiple arrangements as well as the potential to convey a subconscious, or spiritual source.

The inherent allure of Ben Ali Ong’s practice stems from the psychological pull which draws the viewer into each work. Ong’s work has an underlying sense of anguish and sorrow (perhaps even horror) which clings to these black and white photographs. The shadowy, brooding drama and chiaroscuro of the artist’s work captures the delicate interplay between lightness and darkness in a way which acts as a visual metaphor for the vagaries of human existence; alluding to the idea that the beauty and fragility of life are inseparable from the horror and sorrow which accompany it. The resulting emotional pull resonates with and touches some deep inner core which resides within all humanity, transporting us away from our everyday existence. In this way, Ong’s photographs and video works, which are at once both beautiful and frightening, achieve a timeless, unknown, almost half forgotten quality or existence which touches upon ideas of life, death and morality.

Ben is currently showing work as part of Decisive Moments, a photography exhibition at Contact Sheet gallery - as reviewed in the Sydney Morning Herald and the Mosman Daily...

LIAM BENSON // 'OVER VIEW' TRAVELLING INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF VIDEO ART

2015-11-04T11:17:00.002+11:00

Image: Liam Benson, He Looks Just Like His Mother, 2012, HD Video, 2 mins 3 seconds

OVER VIEW
8 countries | 8 curators | 47 artists | 8 exhibitions | 240 minutes of film

Sydney-based inter-disciplinary artist, Liam Benson, has been selected for inclusion in Over View Travelling International Festival of Video Art, a film and video art project initiated in the Netherlands.

Over View provides a spectrum of global visions from a compendium of artists, curators and countries and allows audiences to gain an ‘over view’ of creative practices in the world right now. Curators from participating countries have each composed a 30-minute screening program of contemporary moving image works from key artists in their homelands. The result is a significant collection of audio-visual ‘portraits’ from Australia, Brazil, Costa Rica, Egypt, Hong Kong, Mali, USA, and The Netherlands.

The inaugural Over View festival commenced a world tour in 2014 and will now travel to Sydney during November 2015 for its Australian premiere. Presented by dLux Media Arts and UNSW, the Australian premier of Over View is curated by Sarah Vanderpeer from dLux Media Arts and opens on Friday 6 November at UNSW Galleries.

Sarah Vandepeer has curated a thirty minute program of video works to the theme of ‘what’s on’, in reference to current tendencies and dialectics in Australian contemporary art. Seven important emerging and established Australian artists have been selected: LIAM BENSON, JULIA DAVIS, JOHN A. DOUGLAS, NIKKI LAM, TONY LAWRENCE, LIAM O’BRIEN, NICOLA WALKERDEN.

Over View can be seen at UNSW Galleries from 6-7 November 2015.

SHOUFAY DERZ // THE WISH (THE MAKING OF....)

2015-10-29T12:22:00.001+11:00

Shoufay Derz gives us a photo-diary-style behind the scenes of the making of her upcoming solo exhibition The Wish, with snaps and captions from her instagram. This latest body of work developed as a result of a recent residency undertaken by the artist at Hill End. The Wish will show at Artereal Gallery from 14 November to 19 December with exhibition opening running from 3-5pm, Saturday 14 November.

"Turns out along with ramen artists need maths...or friends who know maths

#trigonometry #friendswithmaths #latergram #buildingatent

#soloshow #artexhibition #arterealgallery #opens Nov 14th"

"Experiments in charring wood #wip #shousgiban #ironbark #artstudio"

"#fire #wood #burntwood #wip #sleepers #ironbank #gum #eucalyptus #shousugiban #artexhibition #studioplay"

"#eucalyptus #eucalytusdye #eucalyptuscinerea #silverdollartree

#silk #naturaldye #homebrew #embroidery #yarn

#silkfloss #copper #coins #cents #currency"

"#beforeandafter #silkfloss #silkthread #naturaldye"

"#clamp #overkill and that's only half of them #copper #wood #wip #artstudio"

"The sleepers, 2015"

"Off to get me some old sleepers...#woodfetish #tigergrain #railwaysleeper

#artmaterials #grain #recycledtimber #woodvein #hardwood"

"Pristine custom frames ready for #eucalyptus and #rust stain #ebonisingwood #tannin

#wip #artstudio #woodstain #ebonizing #frame"

"Fresh batch of #topshelf #Hillend #pure ready for brewing #making #colour

#naturaldye #naturalcolour #dye #earthbrew #Eucalyptus

#wip leaves courtesy of @bradford.j @louise__zhang thanks!"

"Working on new colours from #Eucalyptus #leaves gathered from #HillEnd #regionalnsw #earthbrew

#alchemy #copper #coppermordant #ironmordant #Alummordant #mordant #dye #naturaldye

#dye #fermentation #silk #australia #bush #bushcolour #studioplay

#eucalyptusdye #rustdye #naturaldying #plantdye"

"Playing with new colour palette #eucalyptus & #mistletoe gathered from #hillend #artistresidency

that will eventually dye fine silk in this old #copper #boilerpot #patina

#verdigris for coming solo show @arterealgallery"

"#MorningFog #Hillend #haefligers #kangaroo #ArtistResidency"

"#Moon #Power"

"#moon over #HillEnd #artistresidency"

LOUISE ZHANG // MCA ARTBAR

2015-10-24T12:07:00.003+11:00

Pink Malk, 2015, children's pool, polyurethane foam and plastic, plastic tubes, acrylic,
enamel, PVA glue, synthetic, strawberry oil fragrance, water pumps, Dimensions variable.

This October MCA's ARTBAR: Dystopia will be curated by artist trio Hissy Fit and will feature the work of Artereal artist Louise Zhang.

Zhang's work "Pink Malk" uses strawberry milk in lieu of water to create a fountain that is at once sickly sweet and grotesque.

Be mesmerized and entranced by the pink milk as its pumped through the fountain, zen out, remember your primary schoolyard days, or just marvel at the wonderful mind that is Louise Zhang!

ARTBAR: Dystopia will also involve-

Justin Shoulder’s full face and body sculptures; blurring the line between ‘worn’ and ‘performed’.

performance-lecture by Giselle Stanborough

Play up schoolyard nostalgia with Louise Zhang’s strawberry milk fountain artwork

DJ Sveta and The Smuts serve music on the rooftop terrace

live art and installations from Toby K, Kelly Doley, Salote Tawale and more

"Pink Malk" was originally part of an exhibition entitled A robot attempts to eat a chicken nugget held at Firstdraft Gallery earlier this year featuring Tully Arnot, Josh Harle, Jason Phu, Louise Zhang with curator Luke Letourneau.

GARY SMITH AND DENISE HIGGINS // THE BARBED MAZE

2015-10-22T12:13:00.000+11:00

The Barbed Maze, 2015, mixed media installation; dimensions variable. Photograph by Rob Little RLDI

Gary Smith and Denise Higgins are currently exhibiting their immersive installation, The Barbed Maze at Canberra Contemporary Art Space. David Broker, Director of Canberra Contemporary Art Space writes about this incredible installation piece below...

While Denise Higgins and Gary Smith have established personal practices in installation and painting they occasionally work in collaboration producing massive projects that are technically and conceptually ambitious in the extreme. The barbed maze is a site-specific installation that consists of panels of barbed wire suspended in a gallery of mirrors. 140 square meters of gallery is transformed into a “maze-scape” that is perceptually 4,000 square meters. The maze is a mixed metaphor that explores the darker labyrinthine recesses of the human mind and opens a puzzling path in which the individual might reckon with belief systems, conscience and alternative ideas. Along with many Australians Higgins and Smith have witnessed year after year of heated debate in which notions of national identity are periodically derailed by outbursts of racism, sexism and homophobia. A period of divisive government obsessed with stopping refugee boats, death cults, carbon taxes and challenged by family violence has left the country somewhat bruised. Together, however, these factors create a rich conceptual backdrop against which the barbed maze can operate.

Via infinite reflections through wall-to-wall mirrors Higgins and Smith create a space in which their audience is herded through spikey corridors and paradoxically trapped by its lack of borders, boundaries, or landmarks. In the chambers scattered throughout the maze, audiences are confronted with glimpses of confinement, surveillance and interrogation through the use of sound, video, , tableaux and objects. Higgins notes that this show focuses on the idea of audience being participants in the overall project where entering into the space of the maze they embark on a personal journey. Reflected in a “hall of mirrors” and framed by the barbed wire, they are confronted with a 360° view of the self and it’s sinister shadow, the generator of self-criticism and loathing, that might then be projected onto others.

It is expected that visitors immersed in this installation have a visceral experience of a carceral landscape that amplifies their sense of displacement. It is not the artists’ intent to be overtly political, threatening or to construct a sense of terror, but rather to transform the gallery into an alien environment where audience might experience a state of not being entirely in control. At each turn or cul-de- sac they must make decisions that will impact upon their next move or encounter, where both wit and luck determine the end game. Higgins and Smith liken the experience of their barbed maze to a modern day pilgrimage. The traveller navigates an unfamiliar environment with dead-ends and distractions, where the journey continually causes the traveller to reconsider a path to freedom that is complicated by complex social and environmental factors. The exhibition can also be seen as an exploration of carceral environments and how such places influence the balances of power in human behaviour and relationships.

In order to explore the mindset of “jailer and jailed” or “staff and inmates” Higgins and Smith bring together two potent symbolic forces; barbed wire and the maze. While barbed wire might be among the most familiar of everyday materials, it’s been an effective means of control for unmanageable creatures since the 1940s and in art it is loaded with resonances of brutality. The faces of Jewish prisoners through barbed wire fences in Germany’s WWII concentration camps and more recently Bosnian men in Serbia have left indelible stains on the very notion of humanity. Be it on outback farms, prison walls or Manus island barbed wire also has significant relevance to modern Australia.

In history the maze is a puzzle, to test the visitor’s orientation in a space where markers are removed and replaced by a complex series of confusing pathways. Seemingly innocuous in its sense of play the maze also has a sinister side that has made it a popular thematic in the horror, thriller, suspense and sci-fi genres of popular culture. In the dystopian worlds of Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth (2006), Stanley Kubrick’s Shining (1980) and Wes Ball’s The Maze Runner (2014), the maze is featured as a site of dread that offers a way out, but there is always a price to pay. Interestingly the protagonists of maze melodrama are almost always outsiders on the run from some horror or other, be it the war, domestic violence or the Maze Runner’s “world in catastrophe”. The barbed maze places everyone who enters in this vicarious position with at least one significant difference: the individual is on an inward journey, to be confronted by the scariest creature of all, you.

- David Broker, (Director, Canberra Contemporary Art Space) 2015.

The Barbed Maze runs until the 21st of November at Canberra Contemporary Art Space.

The Barbed Maze, 2015, mixed media installation; dimensions variable. Photograph by Rob Little RLDI

The Barbed Maze, 2015, mixed media installation;

dimensions variable. Photograph by Rob Little RLDI

The Barbed Maze, 2015, mixed media installation;

dimensions variable. Photograph by Rob Little RLDI

ESSENTIAL WEEKEND VIEWING // CONQUEST OF SPACE AND HANNAH GADSBY'S OZ

2015-10-17T10:19:00.003+11:00

Shoufay Derz_Black Lake_2012_pigment print on cotton paper_edition of 5 + 2 AP_107 x 100cm

Conquest Of Space: Science Fiction & Contemporary Art examines the work of Australian artists inspired by science fiction who are exploring its themes and concepts through painting, drawing, sculpture, video and installations. Including examples of work by more than a dozen artists and featuring interviews with some of Australian art’s leading practitioners, Conquest of Space reveals the extraordinary influence of the world’s primary entertainment genre on contemporary art.

This program studies the historical roots of science fiction in the 18th and 19th centuries tracing its beginnings to the literary works of authors such as Mary Shelley, HG Wells and Jules Verne as well as comparing the emergence of sci-fi with the age of imperial colonization by the English during the ‘age of reason’.

Early Australian colonial artists such as Eugene von Guérard and John Glover provide clues as to how sci-fi works in an Australian context and the visual legacy of sci-fi’s golden age introduces us to the work of contemporary painters such as Phil James, Nick Stathopoulos and Ben Frost.

Sci-fi in the post war era is also explored as “Conquest of Space” delves into Frost’s personal connections to the genre in the 1970s. The program then move forward through the latter half of the 20th century and through various sci-fi sub genres as we meet artists such as Sam Leach, who looks the classics to create a sci-fi ambience in his paintings, and Adam Norton, whose paintings and video works are inspired by mid-century sci-fi, and Shalini.

Written and presented by Andrew Frost this program looks at contemporary and historical Australian art and asks two fundamental questions, why are so many artists drawn to sci-fi? And is there something about our time and place at the dawn of the new century that makes science fiction so relevant to the Australian experience?

Featuring work by Artereal artist Shoufay Derz. Click here to watch 'Conquest of Space' on ABC iview.

Liam Benson_Coat of Arms_2010

Armed with a rapier wit and desire to pick beneath the paint, Hannah Gadsby travels across the continent on a mission to debunk the myths of the Australian Identity as defined by our art canon. If our great works are to be believed, the average Aussie is a bloke in a hat who is hell bent on conquering our gum-tree infested landscape single-handedly. Why has this mono-vision of Australia persisted for so long? Surely there is more to us than our most famous artworks suggest?

Knocking on the studio doors of some of this country’s most interesting contemporary artists, Hannah will engage with a new generation who are determined to break open the ideas of what it means to be Australian. Many of these artists’ work speaks directly to our historical canon, challenging its point of view and re-interpreting it to ignite the issues still haunting our political and cultural landscapes.

Featuring work by Artereal artist Liam Benson. Click here to watch 'Hannah Gadsby's Oz' on ABC view.

LIAM BENSON // THE SPACE OF DIFFERENCE, IS THE SPACE OF COLLAPSE

2015-10-15T11:37:00.002+11:00

Liam Benson_Brother Lover_2014

Liam Benson
THE SPACE OF DIFFERENCE, IS THE SPACE OF COLLAPSE
Curated by Shivanjani lal
Gaffa Gallery

15 - 26 October 2015

The Narrative of Location is an ambitious project that will travel across 2 states. It will promote the work of 8 artists who live in 3 different cities over 8 exhibitions. This exhibition series will attempt to have conversations about what it means to be of multiple cultures in contemporary Australia. Specifically it will broaden the migrant and minority story and showcase the complexity of this in a context which will engage artworks and ideas which will challenge the viewers understanding of Australia today. Whilst giving agency to a group of emerging and established artists a chance at creating a prolonged dialogue with an audience.

Conversation 3 centres on: The Space of Difference, is the Space of Collapse. Using acts of performance and embroidery artist Liam Benson’s embroideries offer a site of cultural exchange within the gallery space. On the 17th of October, Liam will sit the gallery space inviting audiences to participate in an exchange of ideas collapsing what is known of both the artist and the process of making to create a new works in Liam’s ongoing accumulative embroidery works, whilst having conversations with the artist. For the exhibition series The Narrative of Location curated by Shavanjani Lal, Liam Benson will be discussing site specific cultural exchange through embroidery. Bensons embroideries celebrate, question and challenge the shifting exchange between majority and minority voices within Australia. His pieces also cross over into participatory performance where viewers are invited to contribute to accumulative embroidery works whilst in conversation with the artist.

ARTIST INTERVIEW // GEORGE RAFTOPOULOS

2015-10-14T16:49:00.001+11:00

To coincide with his current solo exhibition Mythic Nation, we asked George Raftopoulos to tell us a bit more about why he decided to become an artist, how he works, and why art matters....

George Raftopoulos in his studio. Photography by Paul Green.

Describe your work in 100 words or less:

I equate my practice to that of an “Odyssean adventure”. I believe my work reflects a point in time, albeit fleetingly fractured. and yet in another instant sure and precise. I draw upon experiences and comment on them daily. I attempt to make the ‘ordinary extraordinary’. So many amazing things are overlooked for whatever reason…people, places, memoirs - they are all mashed into the vehicle of creativity…and thankfully it resonates with people. This is what I term ‘the democratization’ of abstraction.

Why Art?

It constantly affords me clarity in my life and I believe that the idea that “Art = expression” is a true freedom. Through my art I get lost - only to find myself again - and it is an addictive place to be….

How has your artistic practice changed over time?

I believe I have removed several layers of immaturity from my practice… I am now more comfortable with what I am expressing and not afraid to expose my truth to the world. However this has taken many, many canvases to attain and I still fight for this sense of truth everyday.

Plato and his mates_2015_mixed media on canvas_260 x 220cm. Photography by Paul Green.

Which artistic movements do you most identify with?

Ones that are real and of their time….Dada, Fluxus, the Situationists, they were all, and are all, reactionary and highly driven by a social commentary for truth…I am sitting between all these things.

How do you work? Can you tell us about your process?

I’m an Aesthete and my exercise is to draw and usurp…so I spend time scrawling and scribing never denying that which is automatic. I never deny anything that I have written drawn or thought. So my eyes never cease. As I believe that to be at the best of one’s ability one must constantly exercise one’s arm at what one does….

What themes and ideas do you pursue?

Social commentary, justice akin to Goya and TRUTH!... I am constantly poking fun at the establishment, as I believe that as an artist it is my responsibility to make people look at things alternatively….

Museum Quality_2015_mixed media on canvas_201 x 183cm. Photography by Paul Green.

What is your dream project?

It’s on its way and its huge!!, All I can say is that it encompasses music, theatre and physicality…stay tuned!

Where would you like to be in 5 years?

Back in New York creating large-scale sculptures and paintings that are physically huge and encompass all of my theoretical concerns….

If your work was a…

Song, it would be… PINK MOON by NICK DRAKE.

Smell, it would be… LAVENDER.

Meal, it would be… JAM DONOUGHTS at ODEON in New York.

Animal, it would be… definitely a horse. A horse that would run and never look back, constantly forging forward without fear or trepidation…. It would be brave and conquer - for truth always leads the horse to water…

Word, it would be… NO. People should learn to use it more often!!

YouTube video, it would be… PAUL KELLY’S song “how to make gravy’. It always sends me back to feeling homesick for when we lived in NY and I long for that feeling of homesickness….

George's exhibition Mythic Nation can be seen at Artereal Gallery until 12 November 2015. George will also be hosting an Artist Talk at the gallery from 3pm on Saturday 31 October 2015.

STEVIE FIELDSEND // VAI NIU WAI NIU COCONUT WATER

2015-10-10T14:32:00.001+11:00

Stevie Fieldsend_Malu Orare_2014

Artist, Stevie Fieldsend has been invited to participate in upcoming exhibition 'Vai Niu Wai Niu Coconut Water'. Stevie will be exhibiting recent work from her Umbra and Cauter series. The show if made up of 13 participating artists; Troika Bolatagici, Eric Bridgeman, Stevie Fieldsend, Chantal Fraser, Taloi Havini, Lisa Hilli, Cecilia Kavara Verran, Kristen Little, Latai Taumoepeau, Salote Tamale, Angela Tiatia, Jasmine Togo-Brisby and James Tylor.

Coconut Water engages contested sites of movement and memory spanning shifting lands and waters right across the Moananui a Kiwa, Kiwa’s Great Ocean. Contemporary art practice in still and moving image, sculpture, print and performance address artists’ concerns, including indigeneity, displacement, plantation colonisation, ecological shift, memory, healing, and cultural renewal.

The guest curator of 'Vai Niu Wai Niu Coconut Water' is Léuli Eshraghi. He has been engaged by the MBRC Art Gallery Network for this exhibition.

The exhibition will be held at Caboolture Regional Art Gallery starting late November.

BEN ALI ONG // DECISIVE MOMENTS

2015-10-09T10:34:00.000+11:00

Ben Ali Ong, Refluent Hours #15, 2007, pigment print, edition of 8, 40 x 60cm.

Ben Ali Ong has been invited to participate in Decisive Moments, a photography exhibition at Contact Sheet gallery.

Curated by Sandy Edwards and Paul McDonald, the exhibition contains a single photograph from each artist - selected by the artist. Each work represents a decisive moment within the artist’s practice, which informed their future work or career.

Exhibiting artists include: Matthew Abbott, Ben Ali Ong, Jim Anderson, Christian Blanchard, Anthony Browell, Steven Cavanagh, Catherine Cloran, Jill Crossley, Lynn Daryl Smith, Ruby Davies, Jagath Dheerasekara, Ella Dreyfus, Sandy Edwards Phillip George, Helen Grace, Tim Hixson, Bob Kersey, Kellie Leczinska, Jon Lewis, Glenn Lockitch, Thomas Luscombe, Paul McDonald, Robert McFarlane, Peter Milne, Tony Nolan, Ian Provest, Lynne Roberts-Goodwin, Moshe Rosenzveig, Michael Snelling, Rob Scott-Mitchell, Peter Solness, Julie Sundberg, John Swainston, Jenny Templin, Gordon Undy, Fiona Wolf-Symeonides, William Yang, Anne Zahalka.

As part of the exhibition Ben Ali Ong will be exhibiting an early work from 2007 entitled Refluent Hours #15.

The image in this show is from my 2007 series Refluent Hours. It was the first body of work that I exhibited in the “blurry, grainy and scratched” style that I am now associated with.

At the time I was looking at a lot of etchings and was obsessing over Francisco Goya. I had always liked low-key, grainy monochrome work, and I wanted to distinguish myself in terms of style. So I thought to try to find a way to marry these two qualities that I liked about etchings with that of photography.

After having a go at sand papering and scratching the negative that you see here, I scanned it, and as soon as I saw the preview on the computer, I knew that with a bit of work and finesse I could make it work. For me this was my decisive moment.

The original base image is an old shot of a girlfriend. I have a lot of Persian carpets in my place, and the blanket she is wrapped in was just an old cloth for paining on, hence the drips and marks on it. She was just lying on the floor nude one day and wrapped herself in it, and I thought she looked particularly beautiful so I just took a quick snap. It ended up perfect for the treatment I would later apply, as it has quite a flat two dimensional composition about it - which I think lends itself to the painterly style that the scratching and marking enhances." (Ben Ali Ong, 2015)

Decisive Moments runs from 11 October 2015 - 31 October 2015 at Contact Sheet in St Leonards.

STEVIE FIELDSEND // 15 ARTISTS

2015-10-08T12:01:00.000+11:00

Stevie Fieldsend, Cauter series, 2014, wood and glass, dimensions variable.

Congratulations to Stevie Fieldsend who has been selected as a finalist in 15 artists - an exhibition and annual acquisitive award developed to enhance the Moreton Bay Regional Council Art Collection and exhibition programs. The exhibition is curated to highlight new works by a selected group of emerging, mid-career and established artists with a focus on culture, identity, spirit and sense of place.

In 2015, the selected artists are Keith Burt, Stevie Fieldsend, Shaun Gladwell, Judith Kentish, Sherrie Knipe, Lindy Lee, Euan MacLeod, Deb Mansfield, Deb Mostert, Laurie Nilsen, Mike Riddle, Kristin Tennyson, Kawita Vatanajyankur and Guan Wei.

Artists are selected to reflect the diversity of medium and conceptual themes in contemporary art practice and represent artists at varying stages of their careers. Ultimately the intent is to create an exciting contemporary exhibition out of which a winning work will be chosen and will have a valued place in the Moreton Bay Regional Council Art Collection.

Aspart of this exhibition Stevie Fieldsend is exhibiting three sculptures from her Cauter series.

The exhibition 15 artists will run from 17 September 2015 - 24 October 2015 at Redcliffe City Art Gallery.

YIORYIOS // PAINTING IN PARIS

2015-10-05T12:10:00.000+11:00

Manuka_2015_Acrylic Paint on Aluminium_Various Dimensions

Yoiryois will be exhibiting his sculptures in Painting in Paris at Canberra Contemporary Art Space.

Painting in Paris presents work by two emerging artists on exchange at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Yioryios’ sculptural paintings are inspired by architectural patterns from buildings in Paris, creating work that embodies an innate sense of power, dynamism and speed. Kirrily Humphries’ small scale, finely detailed paintings and drawings respond to architectural space in Paris, examining the deterioration and destruction of space and objects over time.

The show opens on the 15th of October until the 25th of October at Canberra Contemporary Art Space.

FISHER'S GHOST ART PRIZE...

2015-09-26T10:30:00.000+10:00

Shoufay Derz_King for a Day (Stripped)_2015. Photograph by Zan Wimberley.

Congratulations to Liam Benson, Shoufay Derz, George Raftopoulos and Louise Zhang, all of whom are finalists in the 2015 Fisher's Ghost Art Prize...

Liam Benson is a finalist in the Open Category for his recent video work 'Fortitudine' as well as a finalist in the Contemporary Category for his work 'Ned Kelly Red Gum; Hypercolour'.

Shoufay Derz is a finalist in the Open Category for her work 'King for a Day (Stripped)', as is George Raftopouolos for his work 'My Australian History - A Migrant's Tale'.

Louise Zhang is a finalist in the Drawing and Printmaking Category for her work 'Flotsam' as well as in the Sculpture Category for her work 'I went to mars and the isolation and red speckled solar winds eroded my sanity and it was beautiful'.

The winner of each category will be announced on Friday 6 November at Campbelltown Arts Centre.

VIDEO INTERVIEW // HYUN-HEE LEE

2015-09-25T14:45:00.001+10:00

Video created and produced by Fergus Wilson.

An interview with Korean-Australian artist Hyun-Hee Lee who talks about her latest solo exhibition 'Secrete'.

Secrete, signifies a ‘putting away’ and for artist Hyun-Hee Lee the exhibition marks a five-year period of making works in response to memories and to a reconciliation of her separation from family and culture following her migration from Korea to Australia some ten years ago.

Over that time she describes experiencing a sense of dislocation and a certain ‘loss of self’ that encouraged her to: “ search for ways, through my art practice, to develop lasting connections to the culture of my birth.” She achieves this by investigating, and manifesting through her art, the many rituals and practices from three main religions, Shamanism, Buddhism and Confucianism, along withsome superstitious practices that are imbedded in the fabric of Korean culture and the Korean psyche despite its being a complex industrialized society.

Hyun-Hee Lee’s works express a ‘mind-heart-hand continuum’ that reflects the wider philosophies and energy of the artist. Her working process is meditative and ritualistic. This has become a way, along with materials like Hanji paper and silk and ink and methodologies of burning and stitching and preparation of offerings, to establish and maintain emotional and spiritual connections with her Korean heritage.

Her works are very personal yet universal in sentiment. Paintings that are ‘confessions’ are derived from her diaries and expressed with gestural calligraphic marks that are not legibly Korean characters, but which along with her colour choices are evocative of the emotion implicit in the private texts. Some works are dedicated to her father, others like My Prayer and Forgotten are a mother’s paean; a prayer and aspirations for her daughter.

White Tears is developed from poignant memories: “After a family trauma I remember it was heavily snowing all night. I depicted my hopes and dreams as if they were falling like the snow and my tears. I created this work based on the experience of my time spent in the temple to alleviate my feelings of sadness through meditation and prayer. I wanted to connect to this powerful experience and the memories of the many paper prayers hanging in the temple.”

Dear My Father is homage to her father and the scroll form calligraphic Buddhist sayings he would send to her to guide and provide solace for her in times of challenge.

A sense of healing and wanting to put away things from the past characterize Hyun-Hee Lee’s most recent works. The process of her art making is both as performance and a kind of catharsis. Sitting and embroidering she describes as meditative and healing. Stitches close wounds forming silken ‘scars’. Hers is an action, not of forgetting – but recalling; acknowledging, recording and protecting; sometimes wrapping into parcels of time and place, of linking past and present. The artist’s sentiments are personal yet public and shared as singular yet universal emotions.

The series Compassion: wound, Compassion: absolve, Compassion: purge, is a complexsummation work of so many layers - physically, psychologically and spiritually, bringing together influences from the artist’s Buddhist upbringing, Korean cultural heritage and her life experience. The works are vested in meditation process and philosophy where a wound held from the past, through forgiveness (absolution), can be purged and cleansed, leading to enlightenment.

Each Compassion work has multiple small panels of three layers of stitched-together Hanji paper, which is dyed and stained – both physically and metaphorically. The layers are symbolic of past, present and future and secrete the agony or threat within. The rectangular shape and format comes from that of a Sharmanic charm or amulet that will encapsulate a written or drawn message as a protection from evil spirits.

Penitence #2 and Devotion #2 both embody the ritualistic practice of burning; that of the penitent writing with hot wire the feeling or incident to be erased, the heat scorching through three paper layers symbolic of past present and future, leaving a its ‘scar’-like trace. Burning can also be devotional - by the lighting of candles as offerings in church or burning prayer papers in temples. The artist has stitched both the arrays of talismans to stretched transparent silk backings, letting a soft light filter through and between the panels, But she has then overlaid the whole of Devotion #2 in another layer of the silk, signifying balm and protection and putting away.

SVETLANA BAILEY // BOWNESS PHOTOGRAPHY PRIZE

2015-09-23T15:06:00.000+10:00

Svetlana Bailey_Utah_ 2015_from the series All dreams come true_pigment ink-jet print_114.0 x 91.0 cm

Artereal Gallery congratulates Svetlana Bailey who was selected as one of 47 finalists for The Bowness Photography Prize 2015.

Established in 2006 to promote excellence in photography, the annual non-acquisitive William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize is an initiative of the MGA Foundation. The Bowness Photography Prize has quickly become Australia's most coveted photography prize. It is also one of the country's most open prizes for photography. In the past, finalists have included established and emerging photographers, art and commercial photographers.

Svetlana works with images or artifacts that I find, such as on walls, billboards or shop window displays. They present an alternative reality, and I photograph them with their surroundings, and flatten these two spaces into one. Often the images I find are a montage, creating a reality that never truly existed. I collect them into a personal global album of images created by strangers in response to a common dream. Perhaps their makers considered place and interpreted its environment and beliefs, or were trying to shape our perception of reality. I wonder if these images exist for us or against us, if they beautify our life or mislead us, and if believing in their deception adds to our satisfaction.

This year marks the 10th edition of the William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize. On Thursday 1 October the winner will be announced as the $25,000 winner of the William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize.

To keep updated visit the Bowness Prize Facebook.