Kylie Stillman 'Mop Tops' (2006) books 35 x 25 x 30 cm courtesy of the artist & Utopia Art, Sydney
The permanent Making Melbourne exhibition at the City Museum at Old Treasury forms a chronological and historical narrative of the city, with items sourced from a variety of institutional lenders and private collections. Such a loan-based approach suggests the display, in scope and inclusions, is to some extent shifting and evolving, which seems appropriate to a dynamic city.
Within this existing framework, curator Simon Gregg has selected work from thirteen local artists which seeks to integrate with, or respond to, aspects of the display material to form a contemporary counterpoint.
Julia Silvester's exquisite etched glass vessels manage to be both suggestive of clinical purpose and elegantly expressive as objects of beauty. ‘Gardens Of Desire' (2004) might be oddments from the most alluring apothecary's cabinet yet seen, vials, funnels, a filter crucible, a round bottomed flask all inscribed with snatches of random text. Presumably derived from traditional remedies, and folkloric healing practices, there are cryptic references to ‘place a rose leaf over it', ‘eating it will cure him', ‘ulcer on his or her body', ‘this makes them pure and clear...' The botanical imagery reflects not only the historical importance of herbalism in medicine, but the pioneering work of the likes of Sir Joseph Banks in exploring Australian native flora.
Daniel Dorall's work, on a miniature scale of 1:87, is a fascinating exercise in patience and precision. Drawing from his background in architecture, Dorall's work is realised within the claustrophobic confines of a maze structure. Nonetheless, his micro worlds subvert any expectations of cute and benign; the tiny structures usually contain a rather anguished and perversely cruel drama, reminiscent of the sinister tales of Edward Gorey. As these scenarios play out, Dorall's macabre humour and sense of the absurd manages to be at once funny and sadly poignant. On the surface ‘Well' (2007) is a typical bucolic scene, as tiny sheep graze peaceably in paddocks of manicured grass. What is not immediately visible is the stricken figure of a little girl clutching a toy, stranded at the bottom of the well, fretful and alone with only the oblivious sheep for comfort. In Dorall's oeuvre, no one can hear anyone else scream. We are compelled to observe, but cannot act.
Two works use books as a medium, perhaps to ponder the singular ‘weight' of history, progress, and officialdom in the construction of a nation—who is engaged to write it, how is it constructed, and whom might it marginalise, or exclude, in the telling? This is particularly evident with Kylie Stillman's work (which you could well miss) in the right book cabinet of the Deakin room. ‘Mop Tops' (2006) are sandwiched between the augustly bound sets of Charles Knight's Popular History of England (1862) and George Grote's History of Greece (1846-56). Stillman utilises negative space to articulate her point; she incises a ten-book stack to create the outline of a bonsai-size tree, the cross-section of text and illustrations give it character. It is a quiet and knowingly obscene gesture; a pictorial hymn to the absence of the tree itself, reconstituted and shaped within the pages, having been cut down to make room for them. Jayne Dyer's ‘One Reading: 1' (2007) presents eight books piled upon one another drenched in black paint, the top volume splayed, but equally impenetrable - the harbinger of knowledge rendered mute.
Jessica Page's ‘By silent river, by moaning sea/Long and vain shall thy waiting be' (2007) takes its title from the poem ‘The Wreck of the Rivermouth' (1864).2 A cardboard cut-out female figure is clad in a flowing red silk gown which buoys up a galleon in its billowing train like a child's toy. It is suggestive of an immigration narrative: the hardships and struggle of the journey, the disorientation upon arrival, and what it was like to live in the new Australian settlements. Her wearied expression, and the presence of the duck, speaks to the hardships women endured in trying to forge a life, and create a home, for their families whilst trying to emulate the domestic ideals and expectations of ‘mother England'. Similarly Louiseann Zahra-King has crafted beautifully delicate silver plants and flowers preserved under glass domes with ‘but I have to remember that she is still a child' (2002). Like precious and irreplaceable specimens of home, they speak of the fragility of life, perishable, and unable to survive—the plants and crops which would not take in the strange new soil, the children who did not live in the difficult conditions. Placed next to a Victorian mourning gown, the sacrifice and loss of the early settlers is emphasised.
Greer Honeywill 'Circus of Misconception' (2001-07) bronze, gold leaf, mirror glass, found object, plastic type 35 x 39 x 30 cm Courtesy of the artist & Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne; Photography by: John Best
Hannah Bertram's ‘Other Treasures' (2007) echo the foliate scrolls of the Lonsdale silver candelabra and soup tureen in the nearby cabinet. Dale Cox's ‘The Yarra River Cargo Project' (2005) supposes that dredging the depths of the murky tributary has yielded up the 'Entombed Mickey's' as a Disney-sponsored object of cultural veneration, so ubiquitous in its media saturation it has 'always' been there. Greer Honeywill revisits childhood remembrances of the Royal Adelaide Show and of novelty kewpie-dolls3 on sticks for ‘Circus of Misconception' (2001-07). The glowing gold kewpies are caged, signalling her mother's dislike of the dolls, and the longing to possess one that such a strident view elicited in a young girl. An ordinary domestic story is transformed into an odd and perplexing circumstance by the discovery of a kewpie in the back of a cupboard many years later—why had Honeywill's mother kept it? The kewpie becomes a tantalising object of fascination, once unobtainable, now strangely present, with no explanation and no recourse. This leads on to the 'discovery' of the 'Welcome Stranger' gold nugget in 1869, the largest alluvial gold find in the world, a replica of which is opposite Honeywill's work.
Vin Ryan's ‘This Flower Pot is Not an Ashtray' (2007) refers to a sign found abandoned in the city streets, one of many random pieces of ephemera the artist has preserved. These are well paired next to a selection of the 'Drake Letters' found in the vault of Old Treasury in 1997. This collection of 27 letters, cheques, IOUs, and banking receipts relates to George D. Lang and Frederick Lee Drake, falsely imprisoned on the goldfields for embezzlement. One of Ryan's keepsakes boldly states ‘Most corrupt nation u are standing in it' [sic.], a sentiment perhaps Drake and Lang might have appreciated. A discarded diary opened at the week of the owner's period goes on to list her immediate life-goals; an 'Out of Uniform request form' goes on to explain that 'Michael' spilt cereal all over his trousers; while on Noel Jones real estate paper 'Jay' needs a long-sleeve white shirt for the school play. The 'aromatherapy, long term solutions' list would seem to have got off to a bad start with that heading, and 'Victoria's' loving couplets to the feckless 'Wal' promising ‘always and forever', evidently did not resolve that way. Ryan plays on our fascination with the lives of others, their scribbling, their secrets, and the banalities of the day-to-day. Ryan wants to have us squirming with recognition and/or discomfort at the ordinary, while our noses are pressed to the perspex.
Some works bear little relevance to the surrounding objects, and rely more on the stated theme of the room, making their placement seem rather more perfunctory, and the connection more tenuous. This is particularly true of Susan Milne's cement ‘Kitchen Machine FW2' (2007), next to a chair at the entrance to the Deakin room, and surrounded by transport memorabilia. Ruth Hutchinson's collection of porcelain objects, nuts, bolts, washers, and strangely gynaecological implements fared little better at the other end, next to a drum from the Newport railway band. Anna-Maria O'Keeffe's ‘Small Mountain' (2006) seemed 'marooned' by the tide next to a display about beach culture.
The exhibition is accompanied by a substantial catalogue extolling the aims and intentions of the project, with lengthy contributions by Gregg, Martina Copley and Martyn Pedler. It is not feasible to discuss the full extent of these essays here, other than to make a number of more general comments. ‘Artefact' positions itself as part of the wider dialogue about where art ‘belongs' and expectations of how it should be presented. Thus art, and in turn the audience, is ‘liberated' from the strictures imposed by the gallery environment: from reverent contemplation of the ‘art object', to a more informal, spontaneous, and unmediated experience of the work. Gregg suggests that, ‘Artists are seeking to escape this straightjacket and penetrate the sphere of the everyday, in locations such as supermarkets, brothels, and bus shelters'.4 But are they? Which ‘artists' are being referred to? Artists are perhaps more acquainted with the vicissitudes and casual indifference of ‘the sphere of the everyday' than most, and are obliged to be tenacious as a result.
Artists have always needed to be flexible as to the location and manner in which their work appears, simply to have it seen at all—there is nothing new in the need to diversify and adapt. From the cafe/restaurant exhibition, lane ways, and market stalls, to having work exhibited within the commercial space of furniture shops, jewellers, designers, and retailers, the public are accustomed to seeing art displayed in these different or unexpected locations. Much of the discourse about context and placement seems rather moot when most artists are seeking precisely the type of space that provides their work with an ‘uncontaminated voice'.5 In the development of most artistic careers , the degree of credibility and seriousness conferred by exhibiting work in a formal gallery environment would seems to be a goal strived towards—as indeed is being represented by one, as most of the artists selected for Artefact are.6
The most disappointing aspect of the exhibition is the absence of specific and adequate lighting for the works, making it difficult to see a lot of the detail through the perspex cases. Track lighting directed at nearby cabinets and wall plaques make the Artefact contributions look more like an afterthought, lost in the gaps between the ‘real' exhibits. Other three-dimensional works are positioned awkwardly in a way where they cannot be properly viewed in the round, against open blinds or backed against signage, creating a further distraction. This failure to suitably differentiate the exhibition-within-the-exhibition not only lets down the artists, but seemed to result in confusion amongst visitors on a busy Friday afternoon. Small captions and numbers on the plinths did little to enlighten viewers, if overheard comments from the random group present were any gauge.
The scale and priority accorded the permanent displays makes it virtually impossible for the artworks to achieve comparable standing, much less compete for attention. Essentially, the artworks are not given equal weight within the space in order to fulfil the considerable goals and pretensions established for the exhibition by the curatorial team. Gregg was particularly critical of an exhibition last year, ‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum', whose curator attempted to engage with some of the same theoretical concepts, but he deemed that it ‘fell flat through curatorial timidity'. Gregg went on to write that, ‘an idea as conceptually physical as this demanded a presentation with physicality to match.'7 In seeking to challenge perceptions about what an audience will find in a museum space as opposed to a designated art space, one might well ask whether visitors are interested in being ‘challenged' in this way. It seems to condescend to the audience, and fail to take into account whether their choices to attend one venue or another are governed by what they want to see and expect from that experience. Do they not also visit art galleries for other reasons?
Presumably it is mainly tourists and school groups who come to City Museum to engage with the history of Melbourne, and to seek some insights into its past. If individuals and groups visit the Museum for any number of cultural and educational reasons, are their needs being acknowledged by the curatorial imperatives of Artefact? Many members of the public do not buy the catalogue, much less wade through it, and would be in some doubt as to the relevance of what they are seeing. It remains unclear whether the exhibition is intelligible to visitors without exhaustive curatorial exposition. Having spent some time within the rooms just observing and listening to people, there was little interaction (if any) with the artworks—apparently it didn't resonate. So is the audience curatorially tone-deaf? Could it be they simply don't care about the ‘aims' of the exhibition? Possibly both, and neither are unreasonable. Imposing such a concept within a well established exhibition structure risks the distinct possibility that it may well be rejected, or ignored completely by patrons.
At least some of the ponderous theoretical dialogue of Artefact is directed at the so-called ‘white cube polemics',8 but the existing divide between commercial galleries/art dealers and public venues is not mentioned. Given that the former operate in a manner geared to marketing and selling work, which the latter institutions distance themselves from, the general argument as expounded seems to require that distinction be made clear. Whatever observations are presented about designated gallery space, and how artists or the public may perceive or interpret that, it would seem to have little relevance to the core audience of City Museum and its charter. It seems like something of a conceit to assume everyone ‘gets' what you are doing within such a venue, or that it impacts them either way. At some stage it becomes more about a ‘closed circuit' of curators making arguments to other curators about the finer points of current visual art discourse. This is largely in spite of the audience, who deserve more credit for exercising their own discernment on that front.
As an attempt to enliven ‘museum pieces' which might otherwise seem rather fusty and burdened with historical, educational, and situational context, the juxtaposition of the contemporary work is quite engaging (if you are disposed to pursue it). The responses from the artists is in many cases both intriguing and thoughtful. However, Gregg contends that the exhibition,
...seeks to disrupt and challenge preconceptions and, in many cases, misconceptions about where art belongs and how it can be presented. It seeks to realise the unbounded potential for pushing at the limits of contemporary art and the containers that hold it.
Artefact introduces passion to the museum arena...It suffuses the static, sterile displays with creative energy, animating the artefacts from their taxiderminal slumber.
The artworks, in turn, bristle and pulsate within their newfound historiographical context...Their forms, resonating alongside their utilitarian forebears, reverberate with aesthetic sensation; saturated with ambition they hold the potential to impart a deeper understanding of their sociological roots. Superficial differences melt away, and the art and artefacts achieve a synthesis of aesthetic harmony.
Phew. With due respect to the artists and their work, the scope of the exhibition is not substantial enough to be so beleaguered with curatorial intentions it cannot fulfil. In his criticism of the earlier exhibition, Gregg concluded, ‘It remains to be seen whether any museum or art gallery curators pick up on [these] ideas and run with them—for the results would surely be worthwhile'. 10 That sentiment remains valid.
Notes
2 by John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-92), American Quaker poet and abolitionist.
3 based on the illustrations of Rose O'Neil (1874-1944) for the American magazine Ladies Home Journal in 1909.
4 Simon Gregg, ‘Artefact: A Melbourne Keepsake' catalogue, Part 1: 'Art, meet Artefact', City Museum at Old Treasury, Melbourne, p.7.
5 Ibid
6 8 out of the selected 13 artists have formal representation from a commercial gallery.
7 curated by Christine Morrow, Yarra Sculpture Gallery (31 August-16 September, 2006). Simon Gregg in Eyeline , No. 63, Winter, 2007, p.70.
8 Simon Gregg, ‘Artefact: A Melbourne Keepsake' catalogue, op cit , p.6.
10 Simon Gregg in Eyeline , No. 63, Winter, 2007, p.70.
