Suite Case Series Shanghai 2004

Artist Statement 2004 (Shanghai)

This selection of multimedia/montage artwork, examines the ‘landscape’ tradition in the visual arts. The exhibition utilises today’s digital technology to reflect changing attitudes relating to the representation of landscape and ideas relating to ‘landscape’.

Images of landscape make up much of Australian art and its cultural heritage (likewise the Chinese history of Landscape Painting). Landscape motifs feature in some of Australia’s most popular works of art and have long been associated with the development of a national identity. The fact that landscape imagery has played such a major role in Australian art proves that, from very early in the history of Australian settlement, it has been important to comprehend, or at least come to terms with, the new-found land. As artists shifted away from representing landscape with the ‘mother country’ in mind, the awareness of a national identity became stronger, particularly with the advent of Federation in 1902.

During the colonial period in Australia, artists participated in exploratory expeditions, to record the "wilderness" for scientific documentation. By the late nineteenth century, landscapes, formerly analysed and recorded according to European criteria, were re-examined in the context of the development of a national identity. The resulting paintings reflected a "land of opportunity" yet the fear of the unknown, experienced by the early settlers, created a love-hate relationship with the land. Once "tamed" or cultivated, the landscape's purpose was for agricultural production and recreation, away from the urban areas where the bulk of the population had settled.

It is hoped that this exhibition extends the dialogue regarding landscape as a subject in Art and addresses some theoretical/conceptual problems and contradictions associated with the efforts made to understand ‘landscape’ as a subject. This situation is made more complicated as we move through the twenty-first century, environmental problems and the digital revolution are major parts of peoples lives but it is hoped that we move into the future with a broader understanding of the land and our relationship with it.

For me the history of painting in all its facets from all parts of the world is an inspiration and I see photography as part of that history. For me Painting, Photography and Cinema are all visual languages which often converge and interact on many levels, hence the use of video.

Periods of art history such as Russian Constructivism in the earlier part of the 20th Century are particularly inspiring, thus influential to my thinking when constructing my images. When I use a red square the connection is literally, in the visual sense, a kind of acknowledgment of Lissitzky's work, especially ABOUT 2 squares, a kind of homage to the revolutionary spirit of the day. Similarly John Heartfields and George Grosz's political montages are seen as constructions also, acts of labor, not the gestures made by the mythical artist.

My way of working is largely influenced by the process of bricolage, "The activity of roaming in the ruins of culture, picking up useful bits and pieces to keep things going or even make them function better.... to make possible a critical intervention and re-negotiation of meaning.". Sometimes this is a subtle mix/remix, sometimes a bit more loaded, (more so when portraiture is used).
"The procedure of bricolage signals not only the creation of new signs, but the intervention and breaking open of already existing signs."

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