Australian Art Research Articles

Women's Business: Cross-cultural Collaborations in Remote Indigenous Art Centres

The Australian art world has developed a rich discourse on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art since the Western Desert painting movement entered its sights in the 1980s. The form, style and ...

‘Whisper — Status code: No entity found’

Abstract2K-single channel video, colour, 2.1 sound, 4:49 min., 2016. Video and audio: Eckermann/Text: Nestler. Sylvia Eckermann is an Austrian artist whose critical reflections engage with our (in)dividual entanglement in socio-political situations. Eckermann works with various media including digital and physical environments, game mods, installations, videos, objects and sculptures. Her work has been shown internationally since 1989. Among other grants and awards, she is the first recipient of the City of Vienna Award for Media Art (2014). Gerald Nestler is an artist and writer (and sometimes curator) who combines theory and conversation with installation, performance, video, sound, text and speech to explore what he calls the 'derivative condition' of contemporary life

Nikolai Marr: Reconstructing Ani as the Imperial Ideal

Best-known in history for his controversial theory of linguistics, Japhetology, Nikolai Marr was also an important archaeologist early in his career. Suggestively, he was a member of the new generation of scholars who engineered an epistemological shift away from the text to the physical artifact as the primary unit of analysis. In so doing, they were launching a critique of Western Humanism, which they disparaged for what they saw as an aristocratic elitism, based as it was in the aesthetics of classical Greek and Roman antiquities. They would replace this with a universalism that was fundamentally anti-individualistic and collectivist in its analysis. Next to Marr stands Austrian art historian Josef Strzygowski, another member of this school, but one whose differences are as sharp as the similarities between the two are striking.

How Images Actually Work: Settling a Longstanding Debate

As a cultural innovation, image-making is perhaps one of our most enduring forms of new media. The many technical developments necessary for the production of convincing images have emerged over the last 40,000 years, yet there is still widespread disagreement about how images actually function. Why, for instance, are animals largely indifferent to images whereas humans are fascinated by them? Several competing theories are in general circulation but it is a matter of considerable debate whether these adequately explain the mechanisms at work (or at fault) in the substitution of flat objects made of paper, pigment or pixels for the objects they represent. Since the 1960's, Australian art theorist Donald Brook has been exploring the implications of a theory of representation that has been published widely during this period. This work has been positively received but considering its implications it is somewhat surprising that it is not more widely known and discussed. This presentation focuses on a crucial element of Brook's theory which shows how imagistic representations rely not only on systematic sensory discrimination failures but on the procedural principles by which such discrimination failures can be exploited.

The Colour Treatment: A Convergence of Art and Medicine at the Red Cross Russell Lea Nerve Home.

When the Red Cross opened its new convalescent home at Russell Lea in Sydney in 1919, it contained a coloured room designed for treating ‘nerve cases’. This room was painted by Roy de Maistre, a young artist, and was modelled on the Kemp Prossor colour scheme trialled at the McCaul Convalescent Hospital in London for the treatment of shell shock. Dubbed the ‘colour cure’ by the popular press, this unconventional treatment was ignored by the Australian medical profession. The story of de Maistre's colour experiment is not widely known outside the specialist field of Australian art history. Focusing on the colour room as a point of convergence between art and medicine in the context of the First World War, this article investigates Red Cross activities and the care of soldiers suffering from nervous conditions.

Playing Beccy Cole: authenticity, performance and characters in Australian country music

This article explores the performance practices of Australian country music artist Beccy Cole, specifically the development of stage personas or characters as a way of situating herself within various cultural fields. Building on Erving Goffman’s work on performance and everyday life (1959), Judith Butler’s concept of ‘performativity’ and Bourdieu’s practices and habitus, my analysis reveals the practices that produce the public personas or characters. Critiquing the expectation, or even requirement, of honesty in country music, this article argues that characters of Beccy Cole work to disrupt notions of authenticity in performance in the Australian country music community. The ‘literal staginess’ of Beccy’s characters provides an entry point for critiquing the ways in which the ‘real’ and ‘authentic’ are privileged in country music.

Persistent recall: War, feminist psychoanalysis and Tracey Moffatt’s Doomed

Abstract In this article, I argue that Doomed (2007), a ten-minute montage of appropriated disaster footage by Australian artist Tracey Moffatt, offers a unique response to the War on Terror. I compare Moffatt’s piece to the traditional critical readings attributed to artistic deployment of found footage, and consider Doomed in relation to art historian Rosalyn Deutsche’s enquiry into what artists can offer in a time of war. Deutsche uses feminist psychoanalysis to champion Silvia Kolbowski’s video After Hiroshima Mon Amour (2008) as an attempt to destabilize the ‘us versus them’ thinking that perpetuates war. In contrast, I focus on how Moffatt turns to Hollywood-produced action scenes as a way to highlight societal and individual compulsions toward repetition and urges to displace internal anxieties and fears onto others. By appropriating disaster footage, Moffatt creates an opportunity for viewers to consider the repeating patterns of this filmic collective unconscious and the futility of our historic attempts to fully repress the drives it satisfies. Doomed suggests that, rather than finding a way out of binary thinking, video art can highlight the fallacy of cinematic catharsis as a way of ‘working through’ these issues. Acknowledging that we may never be able to rid ourselves of aggressive impulses or fear of the other, Moffatt’s video encourages societal self-reflection and renewed awareness that these psychic forces may be at work when next we find ourselves on the brink of war.

Materiality, Language and the Production of Knowledge: Art, Subjectivity and Indigenous Ontology

Since all theories of knowing deal with the being of subjects, objects, instruments and environments, they can be viewed as onto-epistemological. This chapter examines key ideas that emerge from the work of Julia Kristeva – 'the speaking subject', 'materiality of language' and 'heterogeneity' – to demonstrate how ontology and epistemology are inextricably entwined in knowledge production. Kristeva also affirms both the agency of matter and the dimension of human/subjective agency implicated in cultural production. This is contrasted with Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari’s account creative practice. The article also draws on the artistic work of researcher-practitioner Brian Martin, and his account of the relationship between Indigenous Australian art and culture to demonstrate that in an Indigenous world view, the real, the immaterial, the imaginary and the representational occur concurrently.

Exploring the impact of an arts-based, day options program for young adults with intellectual disabilities

This study explored the perceived impact of participation in Tutti Arts, an art- and music-based, day options program, on the social and emotional wellbeing of young adults with intellectual disabilities. This exploratory research gathered qualitative data from semi-guided interviews and field notes of observations during interviews. Data were analysed using thematic analysis, applying a constant comparative process to develop themes as the data were interpreted. Participants were five young adults with intellectual disabilities, aged between 21 and 27 years, who attended Tutti Arts. In addition to data gathered from these participants, the perceptions of five family members and two support workers were also obtained by interviews, and included in the analysis. Young adults with intellectual disabilities who participated in the Tutti programs experienced a range of social and artistic activities that had a positive impact on their social and emotional wellbeing. Participants reported enjoying performing publicly, developing friendships, meeting new people, receiving accolades from mainstream audiences, and being accepted as professional artists with socially valued roles. The family members and support workers confirmed these outcomes. The resources dedicated to the provision of arts-based, day option programs may assist young artists with intellectual disabilities to plan and enjoy a socially valued role. This may lead to young adults with intellectual disabilities being included in a field of endeavour that further develops their talents to contribute to the culture of the performing arts. This research provided young artists with intellectual disabilities with a voice and an opportunity to express their feelings and experiences of participation in a unique Australian arts program. It also has potential to inform funding bodies and policymakers about how music- and arts-based activities can make a positive difference in the lives of young adults with intellectual disabilities, a group which has received little attention in the literature.

Curation on Campus: An Exhibition Curatorial Experiment for Creative Industries Students

Curation on Campus: An Exhibition Curatorial Experiment for Creative Industries Students

Spinifex People as Cold War Moderns

Aboriginal Australian contemporary artists create works that express indigenous traditions as well as the unprecedented conditions of global modernity. This is especially true for the founders of the Spinifex Arts Project, a collective established in 1997 to create so-called “government paintings”: the large-scale canvases produced as documents of land tenure used in negotiations with the government of Western Australia to reclaim expropriated desert homelands. British and Australian nuclear testing in the 1950s displaced the Anangu juta pila nguru, now known to us as the Spinifex people, from their nomadic lifeworld. Exodus and the subsequent struggle to regain lost homelands through paintings created as corroborating evidence for native title claims make Spinifex canvases not simply expressions of Tjukurpa, or “Dreamings,” but also artifacts of the atomic age and its impact on a culture seemingly far from the front lines of cold war conflict.

Revitalizing Debates around Collective Action and Democracy: A Conversation between Oliver Ressler and Bruce Barber

This text is the result of a discussion conducted via email between Oliver Ressler and Bruce Barber during March 2014. The topics were wide ranging and focused upon material presented by Ressler in his invited lecture at NSCAD University as part of the Public Lecture series. Key topics explored in the conversation include Austrian politics, art and activism, interventionism, collaboration, operative and engaged art practice, the ‘coming community’ (Agamben), ‘Dark Matter’ of the art world (Sholette) and specific projects: Robbery (2008), The Bull Laid Bear (2008) What Is Democracy? (2011), and We Have a Situation Here (2011).

Cultivating imaginative thinking: teacher strategies used in high-performing arts education classrooms

This article reports on recent case-study research that examined teacher- and student-level processes in nine Australian arts classrooms. The selected classrooms, based on the results of a connected longitudinal study, demonstrated strong positive links between arts participation and academic motivation, engagement and achievement. The focus here is on how teachers supported their students to conceive, shape and present imaginative work. Although different approaches were apparent in the dance, drama, film, music and visual arts classrooms, patterns were detected in the processes used to transform imaginative ideas into a creative work. The research indicated that important skills were being developed as the students encountered the ambiguity of the creative process. Furthermore, insights were gained into how work drawing on the imagination can be initiated and sustained through the highs and lows of development to become both a work of art and a learning experience that will augment future creative work.

Thy Thylacoleo is a thylacine

In 2009 two Kimberley rock art paintings were reported as representing Australia’s extinct marsupial lion, Thylacoleo carnifex (Akerman 2009; Akerman and Willing 2009). The first painting was re–examined and confirmed as a representation of Thylacoleo (Woodhouse 2012). Some researchers now refer to the presence of Thylacoleo in Kimberley rock art to support further theories about northern Australian rock art and prehistoric events. This paper argues the case that both paintings represent the thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus, Tasmanian tiger) and not Thylacoleo. Distinctive attributes of the thylacine, present in both paintings, are described. Thylacine paintings are common in the Kimberley and appear in a variety of shapes, sizes, postures and artistic styles. Neither ainting is from the Pleistocene; the first is superimposed over earlier human figures, and, stylistically, neither belongs to the Archaic Period in the Kimberley rock art sequence. Thylacines became extinct on mainland Australia following the arrival of the dingo approximately 3500 years ago (Paddle 2000:20), while Thylacoleo is argued to have become extinct approximately 46,000 years ago (Roberts et al. 2001).

Life Beyond Legacy: George Poonhkin Khut's Distillery: Waveforming

In 2012 the Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) exhibited and acquired the digital installation, Distillery: Waveforming (2012) by Australian artist George Poonhkin Khut. Distillery: Waveforming is an increment in Khut's long running and ongoing biofeedback project. Khut is interested in body-focused interactive art and design, and has described himself as a ‘practice based researcher’. He embeds his art practice within research frameworks and utilises objective methodologies to model and evaluate his practice. Distillery: Waveforming is an interactive, sensory artwork at the heart of which is the human experience. Distillery: Waveforming incorporates the use of an iPad software application (app) called BrightHearts that at the time of acquisition was in a developmental stage. Prior to acquisition it was necessary to resolve issues relating to the ongoing management of an artwork that was essentially a prototype. Distillery: Waveforming is an ensemble of parts incorporating tablet technology in the form of Apple iPads that were loaded with the prototype BrightHearts app, and external data collection, processing and relaying equipment. In order to safeguard the independent operation of the iPad devices and the prototype BrightHearts application, the Gallery undertook iOS device jailbreaking, essentially disengaging the iPads from their proprietary restrictions to allow for greater user control. With the assistance of the artist, QAGOMA has compiled a comprehensive digital archive and strategies for representing and reinterpreting Distillery: Waveforming in the future. The artwork has been recognised as an important legacy acquisition and as a consequence the artist and the Gallery's new media conservator have considered strategies that will allow the artwork to be displayed in alternate modes which achieve an aesthetic authenticity that meets the artist's intent.

Children's story (water dreaming for two children): Johnny Warangkula Tjupurrula.

Life in the Northern Territory of Australia is sustained by sedimentary aquifers accessed by remote wells, caves, and soaks. The indigenouspeople of theNorthern Territory have survived for millennia in this arid country by knowing how to find sources of water and by keeping the locations of water sources to themselves. These locations are often well hidden—a cave entrance may be covered with branches, and a usable soak may be no more than a depression in the ground filled with sand. Traditionally, the custodianof this knowledgewas theWaterMan, represented in the paintingChildren’s Story (WaterDreaming forTwoChildren)by the Indigenous Australian artist Johnny Warangkula (19252001) as a figurewearing body paint and gesturingwith ritual devices. The skills and spatialmemoryof theWaterManwere indispensable. He knew how to scoop sand from a soak until water seeped into the base of the hole and how to find water

Remembering Jo-Anne Duggan: Photography, renaissance and the layers of place

This is a series of notes on the art of Australian photomedia artist and scholar Jo-Anne Duggan (1962–2011) addressing works from the last decade of her career that engaged with museums, public spaces, material culture and histories. More than an exegesis, this is a dialogue: conversations, comments, jokes and written notes we shared throughout our friendship, and in particular during the last year of her life.

Ethnic motifs in the works Leonid Denisenko

Article is devoted to works of prominent Australian artist of Ukrainian origin, Leonid Denisenko. Master widely uses historical and contemporary themes in the design of books, postcards, graphic series, murals, etc. His personal manner is inherent in the organic compound Ukrainian art traditions of visual culture and the art world.

Fluent in Venice: Curating Australian Aboriginal art beyond the ‘urban/desert’ paradigm

Historically, the (re)presentation of Aboriginal art both in Australia and internationally was typically structured by the opposition ‘urban’ versus ‘desert’ art, where the desert signified nature and timelessness, and the city culture, progress and history. A sustained collective effort by cultural practitioners exposed the deep colonialist roots of this opposition. Most commentators now agree that it limits engagement with the practices of Aboriginal artists, and few employ it anymore. As a paradigm, however, it reveals much about constructions of the colonial city. This essay examines how one contemporary art exhibition worked to challenge and transcend this paradigm. Australia's entry at the 47th Venice Biennale (1997), fluent, was co-curated by Brenda L. Croft, Hetti Perkins and Victoria Lynn. It featured the work of three Aboriginal women artists from different language groups, who each continued the artistic practices of her culture: Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Yvonne Koolmatrie and Judy Watson. By focusing on the curators as cultural producers, and closely reading the archival traces of their practice, this essay examines how the exhibition's framework met the city of Venice, and enabled it to make an intervention into the art historical time and space of Aboriginal art, and the Venice Biennale as an institution.

Keeping It Real? Authenticity, Commercialisation and Family in Australian Country Music

Keeping It Real? Authenticity, Commercialisation and Family in Australian Country Music