August Exhibitions
Friday 5 – Saturday 20 August
Opening Event: Friday 5 August 6-8pm
Gallery One
Anie Nheu
Forms on Edge
One of the ideas that sustains Anie Nheu’s visual exploration is the relationship the body forms to the space it inhabits. ‘Relationship’ encapsulates the experiences of a body in a myriad of affect and effects, both tangible and intangible. The background narrative is told through a female body of a perpetual migrant who was born into a predominately patriarchal culture. Resettlement and adaptation brought changes in traditionally assigned roles. Negotiations for place and roles in new communities and at a micro level within the family were acutely felt. These ideas form the basis of the visual framework for the exhibition.
Gallery Two
Sarah Mufford
Repeat
Sarah Mufford’s practice explores intuitive, abstract expressionistic technique juxtaposed with mathematical patterning of circular, sacred geometry derived from Eastern and Western methodologies. It is an acknowledgment of the history of abstraction and uses ritual as both process and philosophical driving force.
Overlapping, repeated circle tessellations form grids emphasising spatial relationships within the composition. The resulting four segmented star-like shapes painted in opaque white and transparent rose reference the mathematical process that Giotto and his Bottega employed in decorative sections such as fabric drapery and also in the manner with which he devised the gold star ceiling of the Scrovegni chapel in Padua, Italy. This geometric ratio is 2:1:2:1:2, or “One Between Two”.
It is also found in traditional Indian Miniature painting and used as a ritualistic mantra and methodology in the depiction of any kind of organisational, decorative pattern from leaf and flower shapes, to fabric, brickwork, carpet and flooring. In Repeat Mufford uses this method of sacred geometry to organise the pattern of tiny plant references, gold leaf work and grid.
The Cranny
Sally Clarke and Brenda Factor
Beast People
Inspired by Dr Moreau’s experimental lab, Clarke and Factor combine, by way of a metaphorical vivisection, their practices and materials to create a hybrid installation of materials and ideas. Clarke literally references the scientist’s laboratory with a suggestion of unintended consequences while Factor produces skins impregnated with medieval imagery of fantastical creatures.
Deep Space
Sara Sohrabian
Rapture/Rupture
Rupture/Rapture addresses the inevitability of change while acknowledging the strong hold that memory can hold over the present. For migrants, who have lost a direct connection to their culture and to the ties of their past, identity shifts between a duality. While embracing the many aspects of a new culture, a feeling of isolation, division and dislocation can ensue. Rupture/Rapture explores these complex feelings.
Images Top to Bottom: Anie Nheu, Double-Edged, 2016, mixed media on design board, 56.5 x 17cm. Image credit: Anie Nheu; Sarah Mufford: Catalunya (detail), 2016. Image courtesy of the artist; Brenda Factor, Skins, 2016, silicon, various dimensions. Image courtesy of the artist; Sara Sohrabian, Rupture/Rapture 5, 2015. Image Courtesy of the artist.