Sculpture and the Enemies Issue1 2013.Indd

SCULPTURE + the enemies

The Art Gallery of South Australia has purchased a work by the Belgian artist, Belinde De Bruycke for its permanent collection......

A confronting work by the contemporary Belgian artist, Belinde De Bruyckere of a pair of entwined headless horse torsos, hangs from the ceiling in the newly refurbished and redisplayed Melrose wing of European Art in the Art Gallery of South Australia.

Suspended from a metal armature, once part of an oil rig, the sculpture hangs in the wing which is devoted to the theme of the human condition. It is displayed near August Rodin’s, ‘The Inner Voice’ c. 1894.The horse sculpture was cast in epoxy resin then covered in real horse skin. This new acquisition has caused some debate and comment in Adelaide, but this response is to be expected as Adelaide has a reputation for being conservative. The work titled, ‘We are all ﬂ esh’ was chosen by Art Gallery Director, Mr Nick Mitzevich.

According to Nick Mitzevich, “If it is a little bit shocking and a little disturbing, that’s the role of art in the society that we live in now. ….It is supposed to change our thinking.” 1.

With the reopening of the Melrose wing of January this year, the Gallery’s traditional chronological system of displaying and hanging art works has been replaced with a display that mixes the art works from different eras. Works from different periods and cultures are displayed together and grouped into themes such as the human condition and mortality. This mix has not deterred people from visiting the gallery, in fact since Mr Mitzevich took up the post as Director in July 2010, attendances have increased signiﬁ cantly.

Berlinde De Bruyckere is known for her sculptures which are confronting, contorted and reconﬁ gured concepts of the body. Each body whether human or equine expresses a range of themes that deﬁ ne our humanity: suffering, loneliness, fragility, vulnerability, imperfection, death and remembrance. De Bruyckere has made the comment: “I wanted to show how helpless a body can be, and the beauty of that body.” 2.

De Bruyckere has been infl uenced by the aesthetics and subject matter of the Flemish Renaissance and other old Masters including the Flemish ‘Vanitas’ – the still life paintings which included symbols depicting the impermanence of earthly life. The work of the German Renaissance painter, Lucas Cranach the Elder who used the physical body to represent the mental condition, particularly infl uences De Bruyckere. She has described what she sees in his works: “their physicality as the medium to express the thoughts and concerns of those fi gures; their fears, their passions, their doubts... it is all to do with man’s mental state which is evoked by the visible body.” 2 De Bruyckere is also infl uenced by war and famine.

De Bruyckere was born in Ghent, Belgium in 1964. Her father worked as a butcher. She grew up used to images of animal’s bodies skinned and headless and hung up on butchers hooks and of white smocks covered in blood. It is clear that these images have also infl uenced her work. She was educated from the age of fi ve at a Catholic Boarding school. However when asked if her work is religious she has said that she does not like to put a label on it, because once you label a work the viewer only focusses on the label. Of her religious education she has commented that reading the Bible is like watching a fi lm by the Italian fi lm maker, Passolini in that it inspires you to start thinking and to reference your own situation.

In her studio in Ghent, a converted catholic boy’s school which she shares with her husband,

1 sculptor Peter Buggenhout, De Bruyckere uses materials such as wax, wood, iron, wool, hair and hides of horses to create her sculptures of tangles of ﬂ esh coloured branches, human bodies that morph into branches or dissolve into a cushion, and of lifeless horses with all their weight and volume. Her works are displayed in different ways- suspended from a ceiling or on a wall, on plinths and sometimes inside old museum cabinets.

De Bruyckere works mostly with wax because it is easily manipulated. As a ﬁ lling material for her sculptures she used epoxy reinforced with a metal construction for strength. She produces silicone moulds made from casts of parts of the body. The moulds are then painted inside with layers of melted coloured wax, with each sculpture requiring numerous pieces of coloured wax. De Bruyckere and her team of assistants then assemble and sew together the moulds. The seams are covered with a further layer of wax. This technique produces her eerie pale translucent bodies with touches of reds and blues to indicate veins and life.

Her artistic career spans 26 years; she reached international recognition at the 2003 Venice Biennale when her sculptures were shown in the Italia Pavillion . In 2011, she was the subject of a major exhibition: ‘Mysterium Leib: Berlinde De Bruyckere in Dialogue with Cranach Pasolini’ at the Moritzburg Foundation in Halle, Germany. 3

De Bruykere studied at the Saint-Lucas Visual Arts School in Ghent where she trained as a painter. From an early time in her artistic career, from the 1990s not long after graduating, her work portrayed themes of suffering and human vulnerability using woollen blankets as the material for her sculptures and installations. Their use was symbolic of warmth and shelter and of the vulnerable during disaster and war; the suffering are covered. One of her ﬁ rst sculptures using blankets consisted simply of a stack of blankets folded on top of an unsteady wooden stool (Untitled, 1991). In a later work, she sewed thousands of ribbons embroidered with the phrase, ‘Innocence can be hell’ onto 200 heavy woollen blankets which she hung up on four huge drying racks. The result – the work was reminiscent of the play houses children construct to hide and play in. The image and the words also conjured up another more distressing image - of refugee camps full of the vulnerable and suffering displaced from their homes. Her ‘Blanket Women’, a series of sculptures she began in the mid-1990s and a continuation of the blanket theme, were of the female form covered in woollen blankets. This work was a response to news footage she saw of blanket covered refugees in Rwanda. Her human ﬁ gures do not have faces because she does not want the viewer to focus only on the face, resulting in the body becoming of less importance.

A few years later De Bruyckere turned to the horse as a subject for her work. In 2000 she was commissioned by the Flanders Fields Museum in the town of Ypres to make a work with war as its theme. After researching WWI she came across many images of streets ﬁ lled with the bodies of horses used during the war. Her work: ﬁ ve life sized splayed legged horses captured in the throes of death in the legendary WWI battle.

De Bruyckere’s process with her horse sculptures is entirely humane. She works closely with the veterinary clinic at Ghent University. When a horse dies, the veterinarians contact her so that she can cast it in epoxy. The skins come from a tanner in Brussels who otherwise would prepare them for the leather industry. For this work, the heads of those corpses were awful to look at and she chose not to show them.

Berlinde De Bruyckere is world renowned and her work has been exhibited in major galleries in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, Finland, Spain, Italy, England, Russia, Brazil, Sweden, the United States, Canada, Korea, China and Australia.

2 3 1.http://www.artgallery.sa.gov.au/agsa/home/Media/docs/Current_media_releases/Melrose_ Wing_MR_FINAL.pdf 2. “Berlinde Bruyckere: We are all Flesh” VCE education kit acca education 3. .(Cranach the Elder and poet and ﬁ lmmaker, Pier Paolo Pasolini)

Bibliography http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/berlinde_debruyckere.htm?section_name=shape_of_ things

http://www.artinfo.com/news/story/31241/berlinde-de-bruyckere

http://www.depont.nl/nc/en/exhibitions/archive/release/pers/berlinde-de-bruyckere-1/

http://www.artnet.com/galleries/exhibitions.asp?HYPERLINK “http://www.artnet.com/galleries/ exhibitions.asp?gid=423838496&cid=68981” gid=423838496&cid=68981

http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/works-born-of-bloodied-memory- 20120601-1zmd6.html

http://www.hauserwirth.com/exhibitions/899/berlinde-de-bruyckere-into-one-another-to-p-p-p/ view/

http://johnmcdonald.net.au/2013/succes-de-scandale-in-adelaide/

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/visual-arts/curtain-rises-on-a-gallery-that-mixes-it-up/story- fn9d3avm-1226556159086

http://www.artgallery.sa.gov.au/agsa/home/Media/docs/Current_media_releases/Melrose_Wing_ MR_FINAL.pdf

http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/berlinde_debruyckere.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/arts/blog/arts-desk/berlinde-de-bruyckere-we-are-all-ﬂ esh-acca-120706/ default.htm

http://www.hauserwirth.com/exhibitions/34/berlinde-de-bruyckere-schmerzensmann/view/

http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/works-born-of-bloodied-memory- 20120601-1zmd6.html

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/review/art-gallery-director-nick-mitzevich-adopts-an-open- door-policy-for-south-australia/story-fn9n8gph-1226323841040

and information provided by Grace Davenport, Donor and Special Events Coordinator at ACCA (the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art and Katrina Hall, ACCA Publicist at ACCA.

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Articles

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33 Auction Results Interview with Xooang Page

Interview with Sue Archer SSculptureandtheenemies.com.auc u l p t u r e a n d t h e e n e m i e s . c o m . a u

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Note: although all editorial material is checked thoroughly for accuracy, neither the editor, nor the publisher can accept responsibility for information in this publication that may be ambiguous or incorrect. ISSN:1837 - 2457 Our Say Something of What We Look Like

Above: Katherine Harrington Above: Zoe Harrington, BFA BA UNSW, Hons National Art School Publisher and Joint Editor Joint Editor

Right: Clara Hali, MFA advisor, sculptor & lecturer at the National Art School

Left: Steve Menteith, Photographer Steven Menteith, BFA (Photography) National Art School; ; Diploma of Photography – Sydney Institute of Technology and City and Guilds photography, Lambeth College – London. www.extramission.com

Right: John Hollaway, BDM Photographer and Graphic Artist

Left: Justin Cooper, BFA Hons Ist Class (National Art School) Sculptor, Drawer and Contributor

Flask with sgrafﬁ to design of peony, Joseon dynasty, middle of 15th century, Buncheong ware, The Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka. Gift of the Sumitomo group. Images courtesy of the Art Gallery of NSW

Bottle with sgrafﬁ to design of peonies, Joseon dynasty, middle of 15th century, Buncheong ware.

Melon-shaped ewer, Goryeo dynasty, 12th century, Celadon. The Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka. Gift of the Sumitomo group. Images courtesy of the Art Gallery of NSW ‘Soul of simplicity: seven centuries of Korean ceramics’ until 21 April 2014 at the Art Gallery of NSW – The 38 objects in this exhibition are drawn from the outstanding collection of Korean ceramics of the Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka (MOCO), Japan. Founded in 1982 by the city of Osaka, this museum is regarded as one of the most recognised centres for the display and study of oriental ceramics worldwide. The selection chosen for this exhibition focuses on the two major periods during which Korean ceramic art had reached its peak, namely the Goryeo (Koryo) (918-1392 AD) and the Joseon (Choson) (1392-1910 AD) dynasties.

Goryeo (or Koryo) was a Korean dynasty established in 918 by General Wong Kon who extended further the borders of the Korean peninsula. Korea is derived from Koryo and is from where the name is derived. Among the artistic accomplishments of Goryeo was its celedon. In 1392, General Yi Songgye overthrew Goryeo and established a new dynasty called the Joseon. This was the longest and the last dynasty. From 1910 until 1945, Korea was under the control of Japan.

The main type of ceramics produced in Korea during the Goryeo period was celadon. In fact the Goryeo dynasty is regarded as the period when the technical foundations were laid for ceramic technology in Korea especially for celedon. The term celedon is the Western term for the Korean ware called cheongja and is thought to have derived from the name of a character in a seventeenth-century French Pastoral comedy. However, there are historians who dispute this nomenclature. The colour of the robe of a character named, celedon was thought to be the same colour as the distinctive green-glazed ceramics from China where celedon originated.

This beautiful ware is typically grey–green in colour. The colour of the Goryeo celedon is due to the kiln fi ring process and to the raw materials – specifi cally the iron in the clay and of the iron oxide, magnesium oxide and quartz particles in the glaze. Temperatures were typically around or below 1150 deg C inside the kiln and the level of oxygen was dramatically reduced at some stage of the fi ring. Goryeo celedon objects range in style from plain and undecorated to having incised, carved, mold impressed or inlaid designs and to objects embellished with colourful compounds such as iron oxide (black or brown) and copper oxide (red) and gold. One of the most skilful types of decoration in Goryeo ceramics was the sanggam (inlay) surface decoration. In this technique, the designs are fi rst carved or incised on the dry clay body then fi lled in with black and/or white slip (liquifi ed clay) after which a translucent glaze is applied and fi nally the object is fi red.

During the Joseon dynasty a number of different styles of ceramics were produced; however, two styles were made more extensively than others, these were buncheong and ﬁ ne white porcelain. Plain elegant, unpretentious, white porcelain vessels were the preferred ware of the social elite or royal court from the 16th century.

During the actual period buncheong ware was made, there was not a designated term for it. The term buncheong popularly used by Westerners is an abbreviation of the term, bunjang hoecheong sagi which was coined and applied to this ware in 1940 by the South Korean art historian, Go Yuseop; it translates to grey-green ceramics decorated with powder”. 2 Flourishing only during the fi rst 200 years of the Joseon dynasty, Bunjeong ware continued the techniques of the preceding Goryeo celedon in that the clay and the glaze are essentially the same but the ware was not as refi ned in most cases. “There is no mistaking the distinctive style of buncheong ware. If Goryeo celedon embodies classical elegance, buncheong ware represents experimental spirit.” 1 Buncheong ware bears distinctive regional characteristics. For example, Buncheong ware from the Gyeongsang province have inlaid or stamped decoration with regular and defi ned patterns, buncheong ware from the Jeolla province has typically incised or sgraffi to inventive designs and buncheong ware from the Chungcheong Province is famous for its iron painted decoration.

Buncheong ceramics was brought to an end by the Japanese invasions between 1592 and 1598 when the ceramic industries were destroyed. Only white porcelain production was later resumed and this ware continued up until the end of the dynasty along with some other styles such as blue and white ware.

1. and 2. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/pnch/hd_pnch.htm

Bibliography http://www.moco.or.jp/en/intro/history_c.html http://www.moco.or.jp/en/intro/history_k.html www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/cela/hd_cela.htm www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/pnch/hd_pnch.htm www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/media-ofﬁ ce/soul-simplicity The Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes 2013

Large canvasses still dominate the Archibald and Sydney based artist, Del Kathryn Barton has won the $75,000 Archibald prize for her large sized portrait of the actor, Hugo Weaving. Weaving is well known for his roles as Elrond in in ‘Lord of the Rings’, as Agent Smith in the Matrix trilogy, and for his roles in smaller ﬁ lms such as ‘Oranges and sunshine’ in which he co stared as Jack.

The $35,000 Wynne Prize went to Imants Tillers with his work using acrylic and gouache on 64 canvas boards titled, ‘Namatjira landscape’. Tillers also won the prize last year. And the $30,000 Sulman Prize went to Victoria Reichelt’s for her oil on linen, ‘After (books)’. There are 38 other ﬁ nalists this year selected from 868 Archibald entries, an increase in the number from last year of 839. The Wynne received 773 entries and the Sulman Prize 626 entries.

Del Kathryn Barton’s paintings are highly decorative, detailed and illustrative. The way she approaches portraiture is to ﬁ rst sit down with her subject and talk about the things that are very signiﬁ cant to them, things that will ultimately become symbolic images incorporated into the portrait. In this painting, Weaving is holding a wild cat with sharp claws and the leaves and the root systems of a weeping Lilly Pilly wind around him and the canvas – these are images that Barton says demonstrate facets of the actor’s personality. Ms Barton said when she talked to Weaving, he spoke about the green man in pagan history, the weeping Lilly Pilly, which he planted on his property, and about animals he could identify with- a wild cat, a leopard or a wolf. This is the fourth time Barton’s work has been exhibited at the Archibald and the second time she has won. Her self portrait with her two children won in 2008. Her portrait of Weaving took 5 months to complete which included four sittings.

Barton graduated from the College of Fine Arts University of NSW in 1993, holding her ﬁ rst solo exhibition at the Arthaus Gallery in Sydney in 1995. Her work is in the collection of the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.

Victoria Reichelt’s work reﬂ ects her concern for objects that are threatened by culture and technology. With the introduction of I Pads and kindles, she sees books are in danger of being replaced. In this painting of the interior of a library, the people have gone and the animals have moved back in to take over. Reichelt has a love for libraries and books and she hopes her paintings will urge people to appreciate the hard copy of a book.

Reichelt approaches her work by ﬁ rst taking a series of photo shoots from within different state libraries around Australia, then on visits to zoos obtains pictures of animals. Her next step is to photo shop her selected images together to put an animal inside a library. From the photo shopped image she paints with oils on linen.

Victoria Reichelt was shortlisted for the Sulman previously. She has a Doctorate of Visual Arts from the Queensland College of Art, Grifﬁ th University, Brisbane. Her work has been exhibited at the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) in Brisbane for the exhibition, ‘Contemporary Australia: Optimism’.

Winner of the Archibald last year: Archibold 2012 Art Gallery of NSW Tim Storrier, ‘The historic wayfarer (after Bosch) (self portrait)

Imant Tiller’s Wynne prize painting is a homage to Albert Namatjira (1902 – 1959) who was famous for his beautifully rendered paintings of the Australian landscape. Tillers work is made up of 64 canvas boards painted in acrylic and gouache. In the early 1980s Tillers adopted a way of working known as the Canvas Board System which involves painting directly onto small canvas boards a style of painting developed in the 70s. Tillers has continued to work on canvas boards since that time to the present and it has become his signature style of painting. Imants Tillers is a visul artist, writer and curator. He was born in Sydney in 1950 and currently lives and works in Cooma, NSW. In 1973 he graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Science in Architecture (Hons) and the University Medal. He has exhibited widely since the late 1960s and has represented Australia at important international exhibitions including the Documenta 7 in 1982 and the 42nd Venice Biennale in 1986. Major surveys of his works have been shown here and overseas including: ‘Imants Tillers: works 1978 – 1988’, Institute of Contemporary Arts , London and ‘Imants Tillers, one world many visions’, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-03-22/archibald-prize-winner-declared/4588148 http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/hugo-weaving-portrait-wins- archibald-20130322-2gjw4.html http://diannetanzergallery.net.au/Victoria-Reichelt http://www.mca.com.au/collection/artist/tillers-imants/ http://oculablack.com/artists/del-kathryn-barton/?gclid=CIPej7nlm7YCFYYhpQodtQMAIA http://nga.gov.au/Exhibition/Tillers/Default.cfm?MnuID=2&GalID=1

Xooang Choi

Choi Xooang began to be recognized from the early 2000’s for his miniature ﬁ gurative sculptures made of painted polymer clay. Since 2007 his work has been enlarged in scale, which gave more presence to his sculpture. Xooang Choi’s work is characterised by its hyper-realism. His work is about the individual living harmoniously in society and constraints.

In a series of work, titled ‘Islets of Aspergers”, Xooang his concrete, mutant, bodies with missing and exaggerated features such as the sculpture of the beggar with huge hands and the body with the huge head making him too heavy to stand.These distorted bodies reﬂ ect government restraints in which a person cannot, hear or see what is going on.

Yoewool Kang – Choi Xooang, born in 1975 in Seoul, Korea received an MFA from the Seoul National University in 2005. Choi has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions including the Seoul Museum of Art, Soma Museum, Seoul, Arko Centre, Seoul and National Museum of Contemporary Art, Korea. His works has been shown in various galleries in Korea including the Doosan Art Centre and the Pruritus, Dukwon Gallery both in Seoul and the Galerie Albert Benamou in Paris, France. He won the Artists of Tomorrow Award 2010, Sungkok Museum Award, Seoul, Korea. His work is in the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Korea.

Question: Your sculptures depict archetypes of marginal characters in society, alienated by mental conditions such as, Asperger’s syndrome. The series of work titled, ‘Islet’s of Asperger’s’suggests that their isolation is so severe that they exist on a separate plain to the rest of us. Do you believe that this is the case?

In this same series of works, are you suggesting that people with Asperger’s or those that are ‘different’ in some manner, are forced into isolation by society or that they isolate themselves, unable to relate to other people? There is an overwhelming feeling of psychological and physical isolation in your works. What inspired you to create these works? Do you feel that in modern society, people ﬁ nd it difﬁ cult to relate to each other?

Xooang Choi: I have been interested in confl icts between the group and the individual, the individual and the individual, and the individual and the inner self. The reason I used ‘Asperger’s’ in the title of my work is because the word implies distinctiveness and strangeness or excess and defi ciency, these terms arise from one’s subjective viewpoint or standards. Within the society or within a group where multiculturalism has not been harmonious, these terms become the criteria for discriminating against the minority, and defi ning a majority. Problems of ‘isolation’ and ‘relationship’ can be discussed in the same light.

Xooang Choi

Your work, ‘The heroine’, is expressive of the pressures on women by society to conform to certain conventions of beauty. She is arranged in a sexually provocative pose, proud of having submitted to the grotesque mutilation. What are you suggesting in this work? Why is she called, ‘The heroine’?

In this work, I wanted to express how an ideology or a value is shaped, established and commonly pursued by the public. “The Heroine” is a metaphor. She is an object complete with three persons - a person wearing the appearance of “beauty,” another person hidden beneath this appearance, and the invisible hand that tied up a splendid ribbon in this process.

You depict people naked. Is this to express vulnerability? Or is it to strip the ﬁ gures of identity?

Nudity in my work is to deprive each ﬁ gure of any visual clue that can be used to identify the person’s character. Through this, it becomes possible to approach the ﬁ gure’s psychological state.

There are times where society demands that the individual suppress his desires and work for the greater good, causing him to sacriﬁ ce his identity. Is this the meaning behind the work, ‘The wing’.

Yes. The work implies such meanings. For every authority it is easy to have a nationalist tendency. Even the concept of ‘public good’ asserted by a nation or a community is often controversial. On the other hand, in the case of a civic movement or revolution, the sacriﬁ ce of an individual bears yet another meaning. This work conveys this dualistic state - the sublimity and the cruelty of “sacriﬁ ce.”

9. With your works, are you trying to inspire awareness of social constraints and forces? Are you trying to affect change?

Yes. However, rather than believing that I can actually initiate such change, I hope my work can offer an opportunity for people to reﬂ ect on the meaning of subjectivity and self-esteem.

There is a continuous theme of shame associated with the body, in your works such as, ‘The awkward age’. The body is the main cause of their isolation- of their vulnerability. Do you think that society makes us feel ashamed of our bodies?

One experiences turbulent confusions going through a period when one’s sexual identity is established- not only physical, functional changes occur in the body, but also gender roles, social constraints and moral taboos begin to suppress the individual. Rather than dealing with shame, I wanted to address the feeling of helplessness, bewilderment and awkwardness that an individual goes through.

Your sculptures tend to be quite small in scale. What does their scale suggest?

Huge statues that can be easily found in public places are overbearing and imposing. On the other hand, ﬁ gures in smaller scale give viewers distance and space to observe them. I have been making my sculpture in smaller scale because this is the size that can convey what I want to express the best.

Xooang Choi The Biennale of Sydney 18th - 27 June until 16 September 2012 The Biennale of Sydney 18th - 27 June until 16 SeptemberXooang Choi 2012

Xooang Choi

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Sue Archer What did you create at art school?

S.A. Art school is actually a long time ago for me but the things that stand out in my memory are having to learn to write in Italic script at the High school that I went to in England which had an Art Stream that ran along side the normal academic one and was a precursor to the Art School where in my 2nd year of that two year course I was expected to attend a ﬁ gure drawing class on a Saturday morning. It was assumed that I would then eventually enrol at the full time Art School. I consider my love of text which has periodically appeared in my work over the years and was very much a feature of the ﬁ rst collage works that I showed publically, stemmed from this time.

One of the other signiﬁ cant memories was a stay at a country annex for Art Students in Suffolk where about six students were able to stay for a couple of weeks and had the use of studio space and were very well fed! During this time I walked in the narrow lanes and observed dead rabbits and birds in the hedgerows which fascinated me enough to make a gestural and expressive painting of a dead bird. I see my series of similar imagery from the 2000’s where I painted from my collection of dehydrated animals and skulls as having a connection to that painting. I was always a painter through my brief time at Art School. I was there less than 2 years and left due to changes in the programme which I felt would signiﬁ cantly impact badly on my painting.

How did your style develop?

S.A. I think the look of my work has developed over many years from the experience of spending a lot of time in the studio painting but also from looking at Art. Although my signature mark – making is mostly constant in my paintings the subject can be quite diverse and being an ideas person I am open to responding to anything that excites me. I also move comfortably from painting to drawing to sculpture with different areas in my studio dedicated to various activities to allow for that to be happening concurrently. Travel has played an important role for me often providing me with new and diverse subject matter and I was fortunate when I was a young artist back in the late 70’s to have residencies in New York and Paris. This experience was signiﬁ cant both in terms of looking at incredible Art but also having studios in which to work and produce artwork. Whist there I also discovered an instant papier mache which I still often use as a medium.

Could you please talk about your coming exhibition at the Janet Clayton Gallery in June 2013.

S.A. My next exhibition at Janet Clayton Gallery, Sydney will feature work which is an extension of my subject of life, aging and death but now focusing on the Self, my-SELF. I am curious about not only how we see ourselves and how others see us but of what and who we are in our subconscious selves. Of course this is only the subject that triggers the imagery, the starting point. Once the ideas start to ﬂ ow and the body of work is underway my practice is to respond to the work itself. Once begun the work feeds itself with me fully immersed in the business of making and responding. Intuition plays a huge part as does loosing oneself in the experience of engagement with the materiality of the chosen medium. To start with I construct scenarios to support ideas i.e. trying to ﬁ nd a new way to present a sense of self. I have bandaged or put a pillowcase over my head and peered out of tiny viewing spaces so that I could see in a mirror and self-photograph in order to discover a sensation and inform an image so that I could construct a different SELF-portrait that might result in a disturbing and psychological set of paintings on paper or clay or bronze sculpture. The exhibition will have sculpture, works on paper and large oil paintings.

Your treatment of the materials, the colours, the rough and rawness of the forms, combined with the highly theatrical yet disturbing images of severed heads, skulls, mythological creatures of

Su Archer nightmares such as Anubis and Medusa create a powerful visceral and emotional response in the viewer. Could you please elaborate your intention in terms of the response by the audience? As well as the synesthetic relationship between the subjects and materials?

S.A. Because of my interest in the psychological SELF-portrait and my desire to present a self- portrait that is not intended to only be recognisable as only a representation of my look but also of something more related to my emotional and private psychology I am less concerned with the viewer than might be otherwise. I am making the work in the studio because that is what I do. I am interested in exhibiting the body of work and discussing it with people but I do not make it for that reason. This actually gives me the freedom to do anything, go anywhere I want to with the work and even to surprise and shock myself! Hence over the last years I have made works that have engaged with strange subject matter! Paint for me has transformative qualities that allow it to be beautiful or terrible and terrifying and to enhance the subject of the painting! My chosen scale is large format 240 x 240cms because I am less in control and able to be more out of control. I love to feel the extent of my body’s stretch and physical limitations. I need a lot of energy to work vigorously and rapidly across a huge surface and to loose myself in the experience where the painting can take over completely and I become a vehicle for the activity that leads to a result. I take breaks after an intense time working and will reﬂ ect while the painting dries enough to continue (hours or days). I move images and reposition, remove large areas of paint, dramatically change the palette and climb up and down the ladder. The paint quality is affected by my choice of medium if I want a more aggressive look to the painting I will use straight oil paint if I want a more sensitive surface I will use a bees-wax medium.

The severed head image came about from instinctively wanting an edgy image and the facial distortions to convey unbridled emotion. The animal skulls became incorporated into my repertoire of imagery because I have a large collection of animal skulls and the skull is so loaded with symbology I felt it would be interesting to see where and how I could use it. I had spent a period drawing in the Veterinary Science Laboratory at Sydney University during Horse Dissection classes and eventually was given a horse skull which inspired some large oil paintings of my self-portrait ﬂ oating along side a horse’s skull (First exhibited in Horsepower at Campbelltown Art Centre 2005).

What does your studio look like? I imagine collected objects arranged around the room and hanging from the ceiling. How do you work? Is your studio disordered? Or ordered?

S.A. My studio is a large split level space similar to a super-farm shed. Around me I have cabinets fi lled with my collections of ‘things’ ranging from dolls to plants, nests and other botanical specimens, animal remnants, small skulls and bones found by me and supplemented by contributions by friends including a large dehydrated kangaroo which hangs from a beam and many larger animal skulls hanging on the studio walls. I have occasionally purchased taxidermy animals and birds which now stand on the top of the cupboards surveying the studio. All of these objects have informed my work over the years and I constantly revisit those cupboards particularly as subjects for drawing. I have several work tables with sketchbooks which I fi ll endlessly documenting my day’s activities with notes and observations of process and photos of works in progress spread out on them. I also have tables for sculpture and tables for small paintings. The studio is organised but has a sense of lots of activity. When painting I work with my large canvasses hanging on the wall as I prefer to see the painting in the position in which it will fi nally be viewed. Sometimes there are four large canvasses hanging but currently I have three sets of shelves, part of an installation piece in progress that is taking up a lot of wall space.

Do you use found objects in your artwork? What makes an object signiﬁ cant?

S.A. I have made sculptural pieces which include found objects but I usually transform them Su Archer and manipulate them so they are not recognisable in the end. I made a series of horses which incorporated various pieces of found material from walks on the beach and currently I am working on a series of paper mache sculptures using a variety of metal stands that I’m collecting from second-hand shops to use as armatures for papier mache. The signiﬁ cance of the found object is often that it stimulates an idea or direction something to work with, like something already in progress. I also enjoy the surprising materials one can make use of.

I’ve read that you have an aversion to conventional portrait painting. Is your approach to ‘the portrait’, by immersing the subject in symbols and icons relevant to them, a way of producing a more realistic portrait? A kind of ‘Dorian Gray’ style portrait?

S.A. I am much more interested in getting under the surface of the skin, of knowing so much more. As my portraits are pretty much conﬁ ned to self-portraits it has become an obsession to investigate my SELF, to look for more meaning and expression in my interpretation. I want to ﬁ nd a truth in my depiction of who I am as closely as I can. It is true I don’t want to limit myself to a clever representation that shows facility and skill above all. I am trying to present my image imbued with some real emotion. I want my self-portrait works to be disquieting and provocative to get a reaction that acknowledges them to be a perspective on a ‘live and feeling’ person not just a likeness.

You have done a series of paintings depicting facial expressions. Do you create images such as these from memory, photography or the traditional way of using a mirror?

S.A. In these works I work directly from a small hand-mirror and pull endless faces at myself ﬁ nding appropriate expressions.

Your paintings and sculptures, in terms of your intense engagement with the materials, incite a powerful emotional and visceral response. In this way, your work reminds me of Francis Bacon’s- have you been compared to this artist before?

S.A. Yes, people have made the association between Francis Bacon’s painting and mine, particularly in relation to my engagement with my use of paint. The oil paint for me is like a living medium and I am constantly fascinated by the way, depending on its use how it can be manipulated and handled to suggest other materials and emotions. I also ﬁ nd it a sensual and evocative medium that if applied with a certain energy can imply emotive passions such as anger and violence and a depth that can suggest a psychological undercurrent, what Bacon refers to as having to do with the nervous system.

Of his work Bacon stated, “I’ve made images the intellect would never make.” There is a sense that your work is also created by the subconscious. However, as opposed to Bacon, I think this is just an illusion, as every mark and symbol presented in your work appears to be deliberate. Is this true?

S.A. I think I start with an idea but that when I am painting there is a point at which I transcend the conscious level and slide into an instinctive trance-like state where the painting process happens as an action both physical and psychological without me making conscious decisions, but later I will stand back and refl ect and then on that basis move forward again by making necessary adjustments and then repeat that process again. So I would say that I am defi nitely unable to describe the way the fi nished work will look or even often what the images might be in the fi nal work.

Presenting one’s own dismembered head in a portrait seems a deliberate reference to famous depictions such as by Caravaggio. However, the juxtaposition of other images such as animal skulls, dangling beside your own severed head, suggests rather a meditation on the subject of death. Is this accurate? S.A. Yes. In the last few years my focus has centred on my curiosity about life, aging, and eventually death. Prompted by the series that dealt with animal remains I naturally progressed to my SELF. Because I have a lot of animal skulls hanging on the wall of my studio I started to include my own head as though it too were strung up hence the dismemberment. I paired my own head with the dismembered horses head as this juxtaposition gave a slightly macabre and peculiar edgy atmosphere to the works. The head for me is where the spirit of the animal seems to be able to be consolidated in the most concentrated and visual way. Therefore the gesture or the psychological impact seemed to be the greatest. I am curious about changes to my own image and psychological Self as I age. I am also intrigued, by the depiction through painting and drawing historically of facial expressions. There are so many portraits through the centuries that present a benign and pleasing likeness. This doesn’t interest me. I am more inclined to look for a facial expression captured in a candid pose where the person is unaware of being observed. Using myself as model has allowed me to explore and construct similar poses using a small hand mirror and working directly from my reﬂ ection. I am more inspired by angry and provocative, desperate grimaces than in meeting a reﬂ ection that just quietly gazes back at me. I also like poses that are ambiguous ‘is it screaming or laughing?’

Death is a prominent theme in your work and is presented in a dark yet theatrical manner. What draws you to the subject of death? In terms of the way you depict it, what are you saying about death?

S.A. My work is often described as being on the dark side. I like the edgy and provocative, something that disquiets the viewer, which makes them have an unfamiliar emotion associated with that subject. I am fascinated by death because beyond the obvious we can only imagine. Collecting animal remains and the use of them as subject matter made me start to ponder death and my natural inclination was to draw a parallel between them and myself. The knowledge that it will happen to all of us, the inevitability of it is probably its attraction. Particularly as one ages it becomes more part of one’s consciousness and I try to make use of 32 Su Archer

Su Archer is having an exhibition of her work at... from... until... those new concerns in my work.

As Bacon says in an interview with David Sylvester ‘Because, if life excites you. Its opposite, like a shadow, death, must excite you’.

In the work, ‘Referencial, Reverential’, the animal skull is stripped of its identity while the human head retains its recognisable features. Is this to suggest the progression of death? Why did you choose an animal skull rather than a human one?

S.A. To me this drawing is about the aliveness of the human head and the deadness of the animal skull.

The reference is to the subject, the reverence for life.

Suzanne Archer ISSN 1837-2457 04

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