Narelle Autio Deidre Brollo Maria Fernanda Cardoso Julia Ciccarone Shaun Gladwell Helga Groves Jess MacNeil Todd McMillan Harry Nankin Bill Viola Wukun Wanambi curated by Meryl Ryan Where there is water… This exhibition not only there is Lake Macquarie embraces notions of our location City Art Gallery. but, through Meryl Ryan’s thoughtful text and selection As we are nestled on the foreshore of a works by contemporary of this country’s largest coastal artists, takes the theme further saltwater lake, overlooking as a metaphor or narrative to an active marina, it is impossible describe aspects of survival, not to consider water an ongoing human emotion, and the state theme in our programming. of the environment. The changing weather reflected in the lake’s surface each day, Congratulations to all those visitors’ delight in the splendour of involved, in particular Ryan the site, the yachts sailing by, and and the artists for such the deep sense of its Aboriginal mesmerising work. Our sincere significance, always remind thanks also to the gallerists for us of where we are. their invaluable support, and the private collectors for generously making their artworks available to the exhibition. I am sure you will all enjoy the exhibition, as much as, if not more than, you enjoy the site. Debbie Abraham Gallery Director Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery 3.30am Friday 17 January 1986 We have been at sea almost a week But mean-spirited dark The pre-dawn watch on ocean As they coast alongside, invisible Large bodies of water, as we’ve The fickle ocean surface, with its Once below the surface everything Indian Ocean near Chagos now – with only the vast waterscape clouds rolled in with the voyages always delivered in one against the night, their scale and all come to learn, are storehouses restless nature, can distract us changes. The mesmeric sounds, Archipelago in sight and us bobbing along like morning and it’s been raining way or another. On deck that night, proximity eventually becomes more of myth, symbol and metaphor; mere mortals from deeper dangers ambiguous imagery and edgeless flotsam. Disappearing could be so and squalling up until now; it brought the soundlessness of of a comfort than a concern. home to enchantments both and revelations. From confined space shape an otherworldly easy. Nobody would notice. Up until the elements playing with us post-storm recovery and glittering, A yacht is a vulnerable interloper sinister and transcendental, vessels we regard the sea with region, a primordial place beyond yesterday, the trip has been a dream rather than taking us forward. slippery surfaces. On others, here. The company of these or a mixture of both. At the respect, hoping for its tolerance, memory but not unlike our original run: 15–20 knot winds, broad reach It’s cool and wet and the current it might bring the pale remote gargantuan escorts feels like legendary Siren call, for instance, and our safe passage. Always the gestational home. It’s a completely all the way with clear skies has positioned Syrius a lot further lights of shipping lane traffic or support and protection against the enraptured mariners have same yet always changing, it has immersive, all-sensory and and hardly a change of sail. north than expected, and off our unexpected nocturnal travelling lurking malevolent leviathans of surrendered to the fatal embrace no memory of us ever having been transformative engagement. course for Peros Banhos... companions. Whales often joined the deep that the imagination can of Neptune’s realm. And many there. It can swallow us in a shape- Every inch of your skin is being me, flanking the hull with little so readily conjure. other creatures looking for sport shifting translucent envelope and touched. You can hear your heart more to herald their arrival than – Charybdis, Hydra, the mighty bear no trace of our ingress. beat and your breath feels solid. the sound of their extraordinary Kraken – have made messy end of And you can scale a rocky cliff breathing; a rhythmical whoosh- countless hapless adventurers. without fear of falling. In this and-shower chorus of natural dream-like place, in-the-moment fountains in the open sea. reverie comes with strict rules to survive by. It’s a world Bill Viola once described as the space between heaven and earth, where you might expect to find angels. 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10/11 12 13 14 15 3.30am Tuesday 8 September 1987 Spectacular approach to Grande It’s six days since we left the After a prolonged period of time Out there, water is in charge. On a documentary not long ago Given the opportunity, I head to Indian Ocean, off the Comoros Comore last night with the Seychelles and I’ve taken over on unstable ground, first sight In here, on land, water is in service. I heard Australian marine scientist the ocean’s edge to find pause deepening claret-red glow to watch (after a two-hour kip) while of land is always complicated. It’s a commodity we knowingly Ove Hoegh-Gulderg call the ocean between the islands of professional starboard and the moon rising low we hove to outside Moroni Harbour Along with the much anticipated abuse. Despite the industrialised ‘the heart and lungs of the earth’. and personal life and obligation; and full in the cloudless dim blue …the sea is empty-of-life quiet, the promise of unrationed fresh world’s most ambitious and For our oceans’ sake, I’d like to possessively connected to the water, to port – the ragged terrain of the boat rocking generously from side water, legroom and new cultural destructive interventions, however, think most people agree with him. yet resisting the undertow’s call to island in distant view, ethereal with to side, creaking like a ghost ship. experiences, comes a real sense water’s contradictory character One legacy of my early nautical greater intimacy. The beach is the changing lights. With the aid of the brilliant moon of loss. Of course, there are the makes it difficult to tame. Salt or journeys is a persistent longing a liminal zone, mediating between and a small kerosene lantern, obvious adjustments to broader fresh, it is both surface and depth, to revisit the sensation of the possible and the impossible, I write to ward off sleep… societal interaction – the mechanics formless and strong, healer and coalescing with the larger more between surefootedness and the of public mooring, negotiations killer. It can be contained yet, mystical shape of things. And I can vast unknown. The changing for temporary visas and the deprived of movement, it becomes only come close to this near wild pace and colours, the syncopated Meryl Ryan sometime-politics of gaining access toxic. The great eloquence of water; in the heavy rain, on the rhythms of fizz, hiss and crash, Curator to facilities. But surrendering the this duality has understandably beach, and by the larger rivers. make it as much a site of sonic and uniquely humbling, uncluttered, supplied poetry, philosophy visual exhilaration as of solace. survival-driven freedom of life at and psychoanalysis with a For me, when I’m near water, sea is a real personal wrench. wide vocabulary of imagery and I am home. water-related analogies to describe aspects of the human condition. Artists and works Narelle Autio Deidre Brollo Maria Fernanda Cardoso Julia Ciccarone Shaun Gladwell Helga Groves Jess MacNeil Born 1969 Adelaide, SA Born 1974 Newcastle, NSW Born 1963 Bogota, Columbia Born 1967 Melbourne, Vic Born 1972 Sydney, NSW Born 1961 Ayr, Queensland Born 1977 Nova Scotia, Canada Lives in Adelaide, SA Lives in Newcastle, NSW Arrived in Australia, 1998 Lives in Melbourne, Vic Lives in London, UK Lives in Melbourne, Vic Lives between London, UK, Lives in Sydney, NSW and Sydney, Australia In 2001 and again in 2005, Narelle Autio Deidre Brollo’s practice is focused primarily Julia Ciccarone’s accomplished paintings Shaun Gladwell critically and poetically Helga Groves partners the haptic and visual was selected by Australian Art Collector on artists’ books and installation. Her work Maria Fernanda Cardoso shot to fame in explore narratives and themes that are deeply links personal experience with contemporary in provocative works that address natural Jess MacNeil works at the points of Magazine as one of the 50 most collectable is a consideration of memory as it relates 1995, with the premiere of Cardoso Flea considered. Not long after graduating from culture and historical references through disasters, environmental change and our intersection between painting, installation, Australian artists. Her extraordinary to place and materiality, exploring the ways Circus at the San Francisco Exploratorium. VCA in 1988, she lived in Italy for 12 months performance, video, painting, photography commodity culture. Since graduating from video and photography, often taking as her work has won her several national and in which memory clings to some places and In 2003, at the Museum of Contemporary Art, as the recipient of the Verdaccio Studio and sculpture. His works engage these Sydney College of the Arts in 1988, she subject matter the dynamics of the human/ international accolades, including World abandons others, and investigating the role Sydney, she mounted the extensive solo show residency. Since 1998, she has lectured at the concerns through forms of urban expression has completed her Master of Visual Arts environment relationship. Water figures Press Awards, an American Picture of of memory in the viewing of art. She holds Zoomorphia, and in 2004 she represented Western Institute of Technology and Monash such as skateboarding, hip-hop, BMX bike (2000) and shown extensively throughout in several of her bodies of work.