artist

Dawn Csutoros – Back in Beijing

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As part of my 9-month art journey this year, I am spending the first month in China.

My link with China began 30 odd years ago when I started learning tai chi and looking into Daoism. But it had never really crossed my mind to travel there. Then in 2007, I received a commission for the JW Marriott Hotel, Beijing. I followed this up with a six-week artist residency in Fei Jia Cun, an art village on the outskirts of Beijing. The artist villages in China are amazing! Imagine a community made up predominantly of artists, the studios generally take up the ground floor of a two storey space, bedroom traditionally upstairs. Kitchen, bathroom and studio downstairs. The atmosphere is supportive, with neighbouring artists visiting each other, discussing ideas for their work and meeting for drinks and openings.  The energy is at once open and enthusiastic; a genuine curiosity to explore new mediums and different techniques.

Dawn group pic
Group picture with Brian Wallace, Director of Red Gate Gallery, Nikolaus Ellrodt, Curator and Director of The Showroom Gallery, Dawn Csutoros, artist, local international artists, Geoff Raby.

2008 came with an invitation to exhibit at the Australian Embassy in Bejing, opened by the acting Ambassador Dr Geoff Raby and Bill Shorten. 2009/10/11 saw more exhibitions including a collaboration with fashion designers for the World Expo, along with travel across the Gobi desert, climbing sacred Taoist mountains and journeying along the silk road to Dunhuang which has the world’s largest collection of Buddhist cave paintings.  This inspired new works, using mediums such as Xuan paper, ink; even tea and black coal entered the work. The materials implicit to the culture were being embedded into my compositions.

In 2013, I was in Songzhuang Art Village for a couple of months and now here I am again, but this time, to exhibit a selection of works spanning 12 years and to stay on for a one month artist residency in 318 International  Art Village, Beijing. The studio space is amazing.  As an artist, it is such a wonderful experience to be able to travel and live in new surrounds, to immerse myself in a completely different culture and see with new eyes. Very inspiring, and I am grateful for the opportunity.

Installation of exhibition at 318 International Art Village, Beijing. Exhibition opened by Counsellor for Public Affairs and Culture, Maree Ringland and former Australian Ambassador Geoff Raby.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I only arrived Tuesday afternoon and the opening was on Saturday in April and the exhibition will continue for one month.  A slight glitch as my tube of drawings decided to stay on an extra day or so in Singapore. However, Nikolaus Elrodt, the curator took it all in his stride and everything was ready on time. Maree Ringland, the cultural attaché opened the show. We started at 3pm and finished the night dancing ‘til 2am.

The next day, I have time to rest and reflect and find myself wondering how my next body of work will evolve.  Despite the pollution, hay fever, traffic and trials with internet, it’s great to be back in Beijing.

Next stop Malta!

To find out more about Dawn, you can visit, http://dawncsutoros.com

Attending to the lightness of seeing

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Drawing and Painting Student, and Guest Blogger Ivana, inspires us with her newly-found dedication to agreeing to pay attention to the act of seeing.

A little while ago a post floated across my facebook feed, one of those pithy inspirational quotes – you know the sort; the sort that is ever so wise and makes you feel good and whole while otherwise scrolling cat vids*.

From William James, the American Philosopher and Psychologist it said simply:

“My experience is what I agree to attend to.”

It got me thinking around a bunch of stuff. Now, some of that stuff is pretty personal and I’ll hold it close but in respect to the act of drawing there is an insight bound in the idea of agreement and attention I thought might be relevant and of interest. Here goes…

Left to my own devices, I’m a sloppy drawer. Hard handed and while not lacking confidence in attacking the page I’m a little too focussed on immediate gratification. I just want to get that damn image down! Quickly. I’ve got 20:20 vision and know one end of a pencil from the other but you might not always be able to tell when looking my work.

Here’s an example, sketched quickly at home:

Moomin with Mummy, Ivana Lees
Moomin with Mummy, Ivana Dash

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So I take drawing classes and I do this for two reasons:

1) To develop technique, and;

2) To tame my giddy inner self and focus on seeing.

It is true that with each drawing and each class my technique improves; manipulation of material and touch becomes easier, tips are gained and tricks learned but… If that’s all a drawing class was, I’d still be a sloppy drawer –with admittedly significantly better tools at my disposal.

So this is where the second point comes in. Obtuse perhaps, but insanely important it’s about the act of seeing – agreeing to pay attention to the act seeing; to force myself to do this in a structured and warm but firm environment.  To learn to look at. To learn to look around. To learn to look through. To learn to truly look. To agree to do this so that I might actually see. Through this, my naturally excited hand becomes light and free; truly trained and tamed and my work while still distinctly mine becomes all the better for it. At least, that’s my goal. Some recent Melbourne Art Class drawing class works:

Ivana, charcoal on paper, March 2016
Ivana Dash, charcoal on paper, March 2016
Ivana, charcoal on paper, March 2016
Ivana Dash, charcoal on paper, March 2016

Now, I’ve done a number of MAC drawing classes with Hilmi Baskurt and am intensely driven to continue however other than the obvious improvement in technique (which in itself is delightful and not in question) I was feeling a little at a loss as to why I was so compelled. After all, I lead a busy life like everybody else and classes come at the cost of doing something else. Then, I saw that little quote and my gut instinct got a voice. I want to learn to see.

I agree to attend to being able to see.

Written by Ivana Dash

*BTW, cat vids are awesome. I have nothing against cat vids. Oh look! Here’s one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUtn3pvWmpg

Award-winning artist Irene Ferguson joins MAC

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We are extremely fortunate to have artist Irene Ferguson in our rank of professional artists/teachers here at Melbourne Art Class!

Irene is currently teaching our popular six-week General Drawing Course, and her Sunday Studio Art Course begins this weekend (enrolments are still open!).

Irene was born in New Zealand and we are very lucky she has chosen to cross the Tasman after wandering all around the world. She completed a Master Fine Arts at the New York Academy of Art, (cum laude) and also has a Diploma of Fine Arts, with Honours (printmaking) from Otago School of Fine Art, Dunedin, New Zealand.

Irene Ferguson with Blue Girl

Irene has had over thirteen solo exhibitions and a number of group exhibitions in her career, and has worked as studio assistant for both Jeff Koons and Louise Bourgeois.

A highly-recognized artist, Irene has been a finalist in many prizes, including the BP Portaiture Award at the National Gallery in London.

Irene is best known for her portraiture work. In 2008 she won the Adam Portraiture Award with her work, The Blue Girl, Johanna Sanders in her Back Yard (pictured).  She travelled to Italy in 2010 to the Charles H. Cecil Studios in Florence, Italy to complete her training in portraiture. And Irene will soon be taking a portraiture class here at MAC!

We currently have one class with Irene with places still available – our Sunday Studio Art Course, where we invite all artists, whether you are a complete beginner and would like to learn how to draw or paint, or if have your on project you would like to work and receive critical feedback. The nine-week course begins this Sunday April 17th, and you can enrol and find out more about the course here: https://artclassmelbourne.com/sunday-studio-art-with-irene-ferguson/.

 

Tim McMonagle – Buangor

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Gnarly eucalyptus trees often seen on a well-travelled stretch of road near the town Buangor, in country Victoria, was the starting point for Tim McMonagle’s latest exhibition. Buangor is a collection of five oil-on-linen paintings, painted on McMonagle’s preferred square format.

Tim McMonagle 'The Admiral' 2016 oil on linen 124.5 x 124.5 cm
Tim McMonagle, ‘The Admiral’ 2016, oil on linen, 124.5 x 124.5 cm

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Each painting consists of one tree in a uniquely contorted form with hints of vitality depicted in the occasional sprouting green leaf. The colours are mostly muted browns, pale blues and greys, mustardy yellows and olive greens. McMonagle added intricate details to his mesmerising trees; hints of vibrant oranges and yellows and texture with brushstrokes and thick paint. An energy is also present, particularly in Pull the Cup 2016.

To paint the twisted, mythical old trees, McMonagle relied heavily on his imagination, but also on a soundtrack to get him into the painting process. “It’s the music that got me into the right head space,” he says. “I put this on everyday I painted.” He is talking about the album, At Action Park by Shellac, an album that’s been described as rock, post-hardcore and punk. The influence of the music is evident in the dynamic and somber elements of the paintings. To expand on this, McMonagle borrowed song titles to name his paintings.

Tim McMonagle, Installation view
Tim McMonagle, Installation view

STATION Gallery, 9 Ellis St, South Yarra

5th-26th March 2016

http://stationgallery.com.au/exhibitions/mcmonagle-2016

Written by Elizabeth Fritz

 

Monet’s water lilies at l’Orangerie, Paris

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I was lucky enough to be in France in May this year and ticked off a few things from my bucket list (read here about visiting Arles and Van Gogh). High up on the list was to see Monet’s water lilies at Le Musee de l’Orangerie in Paris. This small museum is not part of the mainstream tourist route, especially when most people do not have long in the city and try to cram in all the must-see sites in a few days. However, I think the l’Orangerie should be added to the list (though not to everyone’s list because it will get too crowded)! It is not only historically and artistically significant; it also offers some respite from a busy day of being a tourist.  Though you can only truly understand this until you visit…

Paris’ impressive L’Orangerie building, which was used to billet WW1 soldiers who were on leave from the trenches, has housed Claude Monet’s monumental water lily paintings since 1927. 

Monet was invited by then French Prime Minister, and friend, Georges Clemenceau, to display his large-format water lilies, which he began working on in 1914. This project consumed much of Monet’s later years and he worked on them until he passed away in December 1926. A second floor was built at the l’Orangerie, which blocks natural light, intended for the water lilies. They were installed a year after his death.

You have no doubt seen images of the building: two oval-shaped rooms in which you can stand and be immersed – 360 degrees – by Monet’s expanse of eight water lily paintings. As soon as I stepped into the first room, I was moved to tears. As much as it is a cliché, images do not do Monet’s paintings justice, nor the room itself. This is what I mean by offering some respite from being a busy tourist. Monet’s intention was to create “the refuge of a peaceful meditation in the center of a flowering aquarium.” There are seats along the middle of both rooms where you can sit and feel like you are enveloped in Monet’s blues, sweeping greens and expertly brushed water lilies. Monet water lilies

The first room displays the water lily paintings that most people are familiar with and have been used for countless merchandise items (yes I do have one of those notebooks…).  People say that this room evokes the feeling of dawn, with its light blues and peach hues.

tree trunks Monet water lilies

 

 

 

 

 

The second room houses some water lily paintings I had never seen before. This room felt like it was darker, with thick tree trunks dominating surprisingly large portions of the paintings, and sweeping dark green branches. People say this room evokes dusk. I would have to agree; the blues and greens were noticeable darker and the entire room felt cooler. The paintings affect the feeling of the room – for me, the room only exists to experience the water lilies; you could forget where you were when surrounded by them and take in a moment that is truly the present.

If lined up side-by-side, these eight paintings would measure a huge 91 metres. Monet said that he wanted to create “the illusion of an endless whole, of water without horizon or bank.”  And not only does the room allow you to stand back and let all his brushstrokes form his recognizable garden (or the feeling of it), you can walk right up to them (there is not glass protecting them) and see how his water lilies were formed – with three of four perfectly placed red brushstrokes that seem to have been painted at random.water lilies detail

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you are ever in Paris and cannot make the day-trip to Giverny, I urge you to  make time to visit L’Orangerie.  You will be able to imagine what his country garden is like by simply standing, or sitting in these two rooms – and experience what was Monet’s world.

Written by Lauren Ottaway.

Introducing Melbourne artist, Adrian Stojkovich

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We are very fortunate to have Adrian Stojkovich joining us at MAC and presenting our new drawing course.

Adrian is as endearing in real life as his work. He carries a youthful energy, seemingly swaggering on the edge of the precipice of creative potentiality he is about to dive into. His work, traced with cool, skilled abandon is undergird by a sound humanity and is about to fall into something wonderful.

Based in Melbourne, Adrian completed his Bachelor of Fine Art with Honours in 2009, and his Masters of Fine Art in 2013 at the Victorian College of the Arts. His recent show at Paradise Hills in Richmond was made up of room of large abstract works and a room of dead fish paintings. He can handle either style well, demonstrating that he is an artist and painter who has taken the time to explore his craft at a high technical level. The work is infused with subtle passion but maintains the clarity to steer his little project whichever way he chooses.

Adrian Stojkovich’s abstract installation, 2015. Image: Paradise Hills Gallery (http://paradisehills.com.au/)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Adrian’s abstract work comprises  hovering planes of coloured marks on a consistent pale, or dark, or umber background. The marks vary in size and slightly in tone, diffusing beneath layers of thin paint, therefore creating several planes. Despite being on a flat, consistent background, the marks drift off into pockets of infinity. Like little galaxies or the infinite suggested by certain repetitive patterns. These paintings aspire for a greater harmony, a greater resolution, a sense that there is or could be an infinite. The colours Adrain uses are slightly cool and acid, slightly sour yellows and greens, supported by pastels and more mellow cool colours. The colour combinations are fresh enough to keep the whole project interesting yet still harmonise. Abstraction at this end of its historical passage is difficult to do well and Adrian passes it off successfully.

Adrian Stojkovich's abstract installation, 2015. Image: Paradise Hills Gallery
Adrian Stojkovich’s abstract installation, 2015. Image: Paradise Hills Gallery (http://paradisehills.com.au/)

Contrasting these abstract works are the dead fish, Fish Tondo painting, two of which he also presented at Paradise Hills. Painted on large circular canvases, the fish paintings maintain an element of abstraction in the big sweeping forms of fish bodies in glass bowls. Up close, they erupt into the most beautiful colours gently laced with glazing. If for a moment you can avoid seeing the fish as you stand back, they are big sweeping abstracts and up close, masterly plays of raw colour. But they are fish, dead and dumped into a bowl for someone’s consumption or aesthetic amusement. There is a fishy, slimy look to the water they are in, with bubbles hovering around the gill area. They undoubtedly reference the Dutch Golden Age and its genre of dead fish paintings. The works speak of life, survival, death and mortality. Painting is a trade for Adrian, from recent abstraction to 17th century Dutch painting, he knows that trade.

The death of Anastasio Somoza, Modified Mercedes-Benz 280SEL. Image: Matthew Stanton (http://www.adrianstojkovich.com/)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He also knows installation and representation. He created a fascinating work in 2014 whereby he rebuilt from historical photographs, the Mercedes Benz within which Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza was assassinated in 1980. An insightful investigation of popular media, it hovers between the same banal pop appropriation we have become accustomed to in the last three generations and the other tired contemporary art influence, Duchamp’s found object. But it is not the original object and its role as a facsimile seems to be very tentative. The power of the work is in its materiality and absences. It describes severe violence that we are all familiar with from our own current news reports. It describes the destruction of the impact of a rocket propelled grenade on a car. We know it is not the real deal but the materials, charred, torn and burned are the same, not just a copy. There is something real about the object we see. The knowledge that lives were lost is also very real. The absence of bodies in the installation makes the suggestion of death more relevant. The work jolts out from the plethora of violent images we see every day, somehow adding gravitas back to the humanity, or lack of humanity of the those original images. It recontextualises the decontextualised pop image into a new discourse of humanity and mortality.

Adrian is a solid young artist who knows his craft as a painter and handles the complexities of contemporary art and representation well. He has built up a sound base early in his career with wonderful results. Now what remains is to see what Adrian will do next.

Naked Maja, Adrian Stojkovich, Oil on canvas , 2009
Naked Maja, Adrian Stojkovich, Oil on canvas , 2009

Drawing with Adrian Stojkovich

During this six-week course, Adrian will introduce strategies and techniques for drawing from Still Life. This course will assist beginners in developing fundamental drawing techniques. It is also well suited to people with some drawing experience who want to re-establish the foundations of their practice. Read more and enrol here.

Written by Marco Corsini

Colour Sensation: The Works of Melinda Harper

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Written by Elizabeth Fritz

Melinda Harper’s vast kaleidoscopic collection of works has been carefully curated from three decades’ worth of paintings, screen prints, embroideries and much more.

Melinda Harper, Untitled, 2013, oil on canvas, 153 x 122.5 cm, Private collection, Adelaide
Melinda Harper, Untitled, 2013, oil on canvas, 153 x 122.5 cm, Private collection, Adelaide

Harper’s love of abstraction, colour and all manner of materials is evident in every piece. For her it’s in the process of looking and experiencing that developed her complex and precise visual language, which she translates into vivid and dynamic works. Nature and the colours in nature are two of her biggest sources of inspiration; it brings her awareness, she says. “When I look at green, I see ten greens, the flickering colours changing and the movement.”

It’s through this type of intimacy that her works are realised. The colours, which are all carefully considered and mixed by Harper, are also a crucial element in her paintings. Harper explains, “It’s the endless possibilities of where it can go next, and the potential in expanding visually is what drives me.”

Melinda Harper, Untitled, 2000, oil on canvas, 183 x 152.3 cm, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Melinda Harper, Untitled, 2000, oil on canvas, 183 x 152.3 cm, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne

Harper’s art is meant to encourage the viewer to really look.  Some of her paintings are lines as fine as pick-up sticks; some resemble glass shards or laser beams, while others lean towards mosaic-like patterns. Harper says, “I was always interested in abstract art, in the feel of the apple rather than the apple itself.”

Colour Sensation: The Works of Melinda Harper, Installation view, photograph: Christian Capurro, Heide Museum of Modern Art
Colour Sensation: The Works of Melinda Harper, Installation view, photograph: Christian Capurro, Heide Museum of Modern Art

Colour Sensation: The Works of Melinda Harper
Heide Museum of Modern Art – Heide III
7 Templestowe Rd, Victoria 3105
27 June – 25 October

Jennifer Whitten – American hyperrealist painter

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Jennifer Whitten

We had the opportunity of having Jennifer Whiten, an American hyperrealist painter living and working in Melbourne, present for us at our Enderby Studio Art Program class.

Jennifer completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts: Washington University in St. Louis and is currently undertaking a Master of Contemporary Art: Victorian College of the Arts.

Much of her recent work has used images of young girls in otherwise ubiquitous everyday situations such as cooking in the kitchen or dressed up in fancy dresses, common day stuff apart from that their faces are dominated by these massive mouths that obliterate all facial features. Jennifer described how each of these mouths form the shape of the first letter of a word and therefore carry hidden meaning which perhaps someone will unlock. The girls are all communication, and chatter, perhaps as they discover their everyday world and the language that represents and negotiates it.

Large areas of the works are left in flat ‘pop’ colour, negating the overall illusion of space and representation. These areas sometimes go as far as to suggest absence or a hole. These areas not only break up the cohesion of representation but suggest a sense of something beyond, another dimension perhaps. This other plane contrasts with the everyday banter of materiality which otherwise pervades the images. As she expressed an interest in the theory of the 4th dimension during her talk, perhaps Jennifer is looking beyond the limitations of a commonplace material existence and the limitations of how that existence is described.

Jennifer Whitten 1

Jennifer discussed her work, her technique and her position as a hyperrealist painter undertaking her Masters degree at Victoria College of the Arts. She spoke about finding her way through the current dominant visual arts culture which in Australian institutions heavily emphasises new media, installation and conceptual art. Jennifer spoke of the legacy of Modernism which reacted against the history of representation in art and that this reaction persists against the style of work she practices. Despite these difficulties, following a successful recent exhibition Jennifer has noticed a more open attitude to her work.

Jennifer has spent much of this year painting on glass and perspex rather than the previous wood panels and when I visited her a few weeks ago, she had a large panel of thick perspex suspended from her studio roof, upon which she was painting a life-size self portrait as Ophelia. It is an impressive piece of work requiring a wet on wet technique whereby the highlights are pushed through the existing wet paint. Jennifer prefers to work on areas of the painting wet and will sometimes work for days without stopping, to achieve this. I will post about this work as soon as it is finished.

Marco Corsini

– Other Worlds – Philip Wolfhagen’s Latest Exhibition

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by Elizabeth Fritz

Other Worlds, is a collection of landscape paintings that embody the subtleties of the natural world; the changing light and weather, the evolving colours and the textural intricacies of the environment. But it’s the depth within the landscapes, the movement, and the emotional response that standout.

The landscape that surrounds Tasmanian artist Philip Wolfhagen, has been penetrating his being for a long time. They are triggers for new works, sources of colour and light, and they are a connection to the past and the present. Landscapes, and elements within the landscapes fuel his imagination and solidify a starting point. From here, with the inclusion of classical music, beeswax, and a primary colour palette his evocative and perceptual paintings begin to develop.

Philip Wolfhagen The Serpentine Path 2015 Oil and beeswax on linen 96.0 x 338.0 cm (overall) Image courtesy the artist and Karen Woodbury Gallery, Melbourne
Philip Wolfhagen
The Serpentine Path 2015
Oil and beeswax on linen
96.0 x 338.0 cm (overall)
Image courtesy the artist and Karen Woodbury Gallery, Melbourne

The Serpentine Path 2015, a group of three paintings on linen with oil and beeswax, depicts impressions of the undulations in the land. Rocks, shrubs and paths and a never-ending horizon complete the picture. The subdued colours of browns, greys and greens are blended to create contrast, depth and texture all at once. For Wolfhagen, a landscape isn’t about precision and accuracy but rather a representation of the natural world, in which he harnesses the atmosphere, the mood and the light. His paintings are emotive and represent a snapshot of a fleeting moment in nature.

Philip Wolfhagen Other World No. 1 2015 oil and beeswax on linen 200.0 x 214.0 cm Image courtesy the artist and Karen Woodbury Gallery, Melbourne
Philip Wolfhagen
Other World No. 1 2015
oil and beeswax on linen
200.0 x 214.0 cm
Image courtesy the artist and Karen Woodbury Gallery, Melbourne

The large scale Other World No.1 2015 draws the viewer into the landscape. The shear size is like a window you could move through. Strong shades of browns and oranges in the foreground are gradually teamed with greys and blues that fade into the distance. The painting commands stillness as the eye moves into the distance. It is as though Wolfhagen’s landscapes urge the viewer to stop and take notice.

Discussion between author and Philip Wolfhagen
Elizabeth
I have read that music plays a very important part in your painting process. One of the standout features in your paintings is movement, is it your engagement with the music that enlivens your paintings?
Phillip
I would say that listening to music keeps me aloof from the act of painting. It is a means to maintaining a separation; it promotes more rational thought processes, and is a caution against too much self awareness. It is possible that the influence of the music translates into movement, if not in the image itself, then certainly in the accumulation of gestures that comprise the image.
Elizabeth 
Another standout feature is the depth you create in your landscapes. Does the depth represent the deep feelings you have with the natural world and the deep respect for the historical and cultural past?
Phillip 
The illusion of receding space is a vital element in my work because each successive painting is representative of a journey; a never ending reinvention of self. The passage from ones own position to the always shifting vanishing point is inexhaustible in its potential for meaning. 

Philip Wolfhagen
Other Worlds
1 July-1 August 2015

Karen Woodbury Gallery
Level 1/167 Flinders Lane
Melbourne

Melbourne Exhibition Review: Kate Daw – Love, Work (Show Me Grace)

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Kate Daw: Love, Work (Show Me Grace)
at Sarah Scout Presents, Melbourne

Elizabeth Fritz

Kate Daw’s exhibition, Love, Work (Show Me Grace) is her third solo exhibition at Sarah Scout Presents.

As I entered the gallery’s hallway, I was surrounded by pale lilac wallpaper with a floral motif. This is Daw’s installation that has been described as ambitious. It felt intimate and inviting and made quite an impact but on closer inspection it started to reveal a whole lot more.

I started noticing uneven edges and fraying, this wallpaper is in fact pieces of dyed calico that have been pasted to the wall. The origin of the floral images is twofold; the gardenias are photographs straight from Daw’s garden and her student created the linear flower drawing. These two images have been printed onto fabric to create a visually rich and somewhat feminine feel. The textural effect works well. “Striking” commented a man as he walked into the hallway.

Image courtesy of artist and Sarah Scout Presents.
Image courtesy of artist and Sarah Scout Presents.

The remaining space is comprised of a further two rooms. The artwork in the first room was not what I expected. There are two paintings, one on canvas with the word ‘MAM’SELLE’ and the other on reclaimed blackboards comprising of light blue flowers heads. On the adjacent wall was a series of small boards, some with text and some with images. I read the texts over and over trying to get a sense of the meaning. One of the boards posed this question; “What is important in your life? “Fresh coffee and a sense of autonomy” was the response. There are in fact big questions offered up on these small boards. Such as what true happiness might be? And is there ever a point of satisfaction we arrive at? What initially appeared to be a somewhat underwhelming room was suddenly being transformed into a contemplative space. Here the viewer could be confronted with weighty topics that were based on actual conversations between Daw and a few young women.

Daw’s diverse influences continue to be evident in the second room. Floral motifs, words painted on black boards and references to sisterhood dominate.

KATE DAW Blue Flowers (when we slept in the studio you gave me some good ideas) 2015 oil paint on found blackboard 41.5 x 60.5 cm (framed) Image courtesy the artist and Sarah Scout Presents
KATE DAW Blue Flowers (when we slept in the studio you gave me some good ideas)
2015
oil paint on found blackboard
41.5 x 60.5 cm (framed)
Image courtesy the artist and Sarah Scout Presents
“I am not really interested in logical links, rather how far I can stretch things both from their     original source and from one another. I am fascinated by certain books, relationships, memories and associative, sensory experience, among other things.”
Kate Daw in conversation with author.

Love, Work (Show Me Grace) is a collection that showcases Daw’s interest in literature, design and reproduction but at the same time there is something jarring about how she paired the complexities of the underlying subject matter to the almost simplistic, child-like works of art. But perhaps this is precisely what makes it compelling and thought provoking.

Love, Work (Show Me Grace), until May 16
Open Wed-Sat 12pm-5pm

sarahscoutpresents.com
Suite 15, Level 1
12 Collins St. Melbourne