The Artist and the Museum: Contested Histories and Expanded Narratives in Australian Art and Museology 1975-2002
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The Artist and the Museum: Contested Histories and Expanded Narratives in Australian Art and Museology 1975-2002 Katherine Louise Gregory Submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy October 2004 School of Art History, Cinema, Classics and Archaeology The University of Melbourne © Katherine Louise Gregory Abstract This thesis explores the rich and provocative fields of interaction between Australian artists and museums from 1975 to 2002. Artists have investigated and engaged with museums of art, social history and natural science during this period. Despite the museum being a major source of exploration for artists, the subject has rarely been examined in the literature. This thesis redresses this gap. It identifies and examines four prevailing approaches of Australian contemporary art to museums in this period: oppositional critique, figurative representation, intervention and collaboration. The study asserts that a general progression from oppositional critique in the seventies through to collaboration in the late nineties can be charted. It explores the work of three artists who have epitomised these approaches to the museum. Peter Cripps developed an oppositional critique of the museum and was intimately involved with the art museum politics in Melbourne during the mid-seventies. Fiona Hall figuratively represented the museum. Her approach documented and catalogued museum tropes of a bygone era. Narelle Jubelin’s work intervened with Australian museums. Her work has curatorial capacities and has had real effect within Australian museums. These differing artistic approaches to the museum have the effect of contesting history and expanding narrative within museums. Curators collaborated with artists and used artistic methods to create exhibits in Australian museums during the 1990s. Artistic approaches are a major methodology of museums seeking to contest traditional modes of history and expand narrative in their exhibits. Contemporary art has played a vital, curatorial, role in the Hyde Park Barracks, Museum of Sydney, Melbourne Museum and Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia, amongst other museums. While in earlier years artists were well known for their resistive approach to the art museum, this thesis shows that artists have increasingly participated in new forms of representation within art, social history, and natural history museums. I argue that the role of contemporary art within ‘new’ museums is emblematic of new approaches to history, space, narrative and design within the museum. This is to certify that (i) the thesis comprises only my original work towards the PhD, (ii) due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used, (iii) the thesis is less than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of tables, maps, bibliographies, appendices and footnotes. Acknowledgements This thesis has benefited from the assistance of numerous people. I thank my principal supervisor, Dr Christopher Marshall, whose guidance, insight and continual support for the project, has enabled me to bring this thesis to fruition. I am thankful for the contribution of my associate supervisor Dr Charles Green in the latter stages of this thesis. Associate Professor Jeanette Hoorn helped in the early exploration of the topic. The University of Melbourne provided me with a Melbourne Research Scholarship to undertake my research. The School of Art History, Cinema, Classics and Archaeology, Faculty of Arts and Ian Potter Cultural Trust supported me with grants that contributed to interstate and overseas research and allowed me to attend conferences. I was fortunate to attend a Visiting Scholars Program on National Museums, National Histories at the Centre for Cross-Cultural Research at the Australian National University in 1999, which provided me with a forum in which I could test my ideas amongst friends and colleagues. I wish to thank the main subjects of this thesis, the artists Peter Cripps, Fiona Hall and Narelle Jubelin, who generously responded to my requests and questions during interviews and throughout our correspondences. Thanks are also due to the artists Anne Ferran, Janet Laurence and Julie Gough and to the curators and museum staff John Barrett-Lennard at the Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, Ann Stephen at the Powerhouse Museum, Peter Emmett formerly of the Hyde Park Barracks and Museum of Sydney, Lynn Collins at the Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales, Roonie Fookes and Eve Almond at the Melbourne Museum, and Frances Lindsay and Jennifer Phipps the National Gallery of Victoria, all of whom I interviewed. The School of Art History, Cinema, Classics and Archaeology at the University of Melbourne gave me teaching opportunities during my candidature. Thanks also to Dr Clarissa Ball and Dr Ian McLean who offered me teaching in Perth, at the School of Fine Arts and Architecture at the University of Western Australia, in the latter stages of my candidature. I am grateful for the support and encouragement of my friends and family throughout the production of this thesis. I thank my parents, Ross and Jenny Gregory, who have had faith in me, read drafts with rigour and care, and provided me with the resources that allowed me to finish this thesis. Table of Contents – Volume One Introduction 1 Prologue. From Real Threat to Symbolic 18 Chapter One. The Ideal Archive: the artist’s museum in the work of Peter Cripps 1975-1996 26 Introduction 26 From Artists’ Artists to an artist’s museum: the curatorial context of Cripps’s archival art practice 1974-1977 28 a. Artists’ Artists and the art museum politics of the mid-seventies 28 b. The Caravan and self-curatorial activities 46 Cripps’s curatorial practice and critique of history in the 1980s 64 Symbolic critique of the museum 1989-1991 73 An archaeology of the museum 1992-1993 80 Conclusion 89 Chapter Two. The Figurative Museum: museum tropes in Fiona Hall’s work 1981- 2002 92 Introduction 92 Keeping it messy: museum disorder in The Antipodean Suite (1981) 94 Wonder and the Hybrid Object in Hall’s work 102 Museum as shrine: Give a Dog a Bone (1996) 112 Museum projects 1996-1998 117 Displaying the curious 1998-2002 124 Conclusion 135 Chapter Three. Museum Interventions: Narelle Jubelin as artist, curator and essayist 1986-1995 138 Introduction 138 A feminist intervention: looking and language 140 Entering the museum: institutional and bureaucratic passage in the Powerhouse Museum 150 Convergence: art installation as museum exhibit 166 Narrative and Revisionist History in Dead Slow (1992) and Soft Shoulder (1994) 174 Maintaining critical passage in the Museum of Sydney 1995 183 Conclusion 194 Chapter Four. Curator as Artist, Artist as Curator: speculative approaches to interpretation and commemoration in Australian museology 1989-1998 196 Introduction 196 Curator as artist: Peter Emmett’s museology in the Hyde Park Barracks 1989-91 197 a. Theatrics 201 b. Fragments 205 c. Aesthetics 208 d. Parallels 210 e. Criticisms 215 Artist as curator: artists’ interpretations of the Barracks’ archive 1995 217 Art, experience and commemoration: Edge of the Trees (1995) the Museum of Sydney 227 Creative licence in site-specific art in Elizabeth Bay House (1997) and the Grainger Museum (1998) 235 Conclusion 247 Chapter Five. The Artist as an Instrument of the New Museum 1999-2002 249 Introduction 249 Reconfiguring wonder: art in the new Melbourne Museum 1999 250 Reconfiguring the white cube: art intervention in the new ‘permeable’ Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia 2002 275 Conclusion 299 Conclusion 301 Bibliography 310 Appendix 328 1 Introduction Blurred genres, interdisciplinary collaboration and greater public participation than ever before characterise museums of the early twenty-first century. New methods are increasingly sought through which to expand and contest old museum practices. History, narrative, space and design have come under scrutiny in museums wishing to reconfigure past approaches to representation. Within this spectrum of change, artistic approaches to interpretation and design have played a vital role: artists collaborate with curators to develop new forms of exhibit in museums of art, social history and natural science. Despite this, the role of the artist in the new museum has rarely been explored. Little is known about the changing role of contemporary art in museums and the changing relationship of artists to museums. Yet, because artistic approaches are increasingly used in new museums, it is essential to understand the specific nature of art’s engagement with the museum. If artistic approaches continue to define new forms of practice in museums, we must gain an understanding of the history and scope of art’s investigation of museums so that museums can draw on the full range of possibilities that art offers and adequately accommodate art’s various tactics. This thesis aims to examine the prevailing approaches of Australian contemporary art to museums between 1975 and 2002. During this period, Australian art explicitly addressed museums, and Australian museum practice underwent significant change. By tracing the way that art has investigated the museum in this period, this thesis aims to shed light on the increasing use of artistic methods in new Australian museums. As this thesis will show, artists have addressed museums extensively and influenced exhibition design and curatorial approaches through their various interrogations and speculations. The museum has also influenced contemporary art, as will become apparent. How has contemporary art come to signify ‘newness’ within new museums? What is contemporary art’s role and effect within new museums? What does this suggest about art’s shifting and continuous relationship to museums? These questions provide the impetus for my examination of Australian art’s approach to museums and its 2 intersection with museum practice that gave rise to creative, sometimes fraught, collaborations. I anticipate that this thesis will not only contribute to a greater depth of understanding about Australian art practice since 1975, but also to a long overdue evaluation of the role of contemporary art within museums and how this work relates to broader shifts in the field of Australian museology.