Exhibition Photos: Material Satisfaction
2 years, 9 months ago
A few days have past since the opening of Material Satisfaction, and I’ve had a chance to get in a take some pictures of the works and the gallery setup. The opening was fantasic - a festival of familiar friendly faces
- and there has been a very good buzz to the show. The make-up of the opening crowd was a little more family and friends than it normally is, possibly as we had not done a comprehensive mail-out. I don’t think it suffered from that at all, however, as there has been a fair number of people coming through on the way to the COFA Grad show (which is on in parallel).
As I have said, the show has a really unique energy to it, which I’m quite proud of. 
All the works are documented in a Flickr set, that you are strongly encouraged to check out! The index picture to the set - at the top of this entry - shows some of Dan Simon’s rubber sex-dolls. These aren’t exactly indicative of the tone of the show, but are the most visually striking element as you might imagine. You may also be surprised by the non-interactive/technological nature of my contribution to the exhibition (i.e. “Ghede”, a suicide stuffed bunny rabbit). To be honest, there was a constellation of reasons I did this work. Amongst them; the worry (of fault, of theft) attributed to having tech art in an exhibition, my recent view of the art I’ve been making, and a frustrated and sobre mood that pushed me to kill a bunny. I am very happy with how he turned out though, especially with the interplay of Dave’s red-light piece and Anna’s uncanny video piece opposite.
This evening I should be adding an annotated gallery plan to illustrate the position of works. Watch this space!
Edit: And here it is!
- The layout/plan of Kudos gallery for our exhibition, including artwork positions.
and here’s a
November 26th, 2005 at 12:00 am
Hmm, now I wish I had made the trek all the way in. I like the photos you’ve put up, and some of the works… and two thumbs up for the layout/plan. No crazy fly-thru though?
November 27th, 2005 at 12:32 am
i cannot appreciate the artistic output of a group of people who obviously have something to think about, and a considered message to express, but lack the motivation to complete a work. i think it is a disgrace to artists and the sydney art world to pass off such unfinished and underdeveloped manifestations of artistic expression. it is not becoming of the artists in question. a group of students who have had exhibition experience; time, money, and concept not an obstacle - should be producing polished, interesting and contemporary works that enter into current dialogues. i would not dare disparage any individual at this point without entering into a fair discourse with any opposition. however, it is needless to say that i am at any rate dissapointed. the group of students i am referring to can take comfort in the fact that they have had such a negative impact upon my senses and sensibilities that they have provoked such a reaction as this. even i would argue that in a post-modern society that any response should be appreciated. this may be your only saving grace.
November 27th, 2005 at 4:16 pm
Y’know, I [surprisingly] find myself in agreement with Mr. H. Perhaps not as far as to say that they’ve had a decisively ‘negative impact upon my senses and sensibilities’, but I do think some of the works weren’t terribly strong, especially with the degree of work some of the artists have produced before. Hmm.
November 27th, 2005 at 9:58 pm
Okay, where to start?
Regarding Blessi’s comment, I don’t think that the strength of one’s work neccessarily has any correllation to the the time, money, or degree of work one has produced before. It would seem that by “strength” of work you are talking either of the emotional impact, or the conceptual value. Emotional impact of course is subjective, and obviously to some degree so is your evaluation of the works conceptual value. Both rely on your position with respect to and sensitivity to the body of symbols within the work.
Onto Hayden: There is so much negative emotion in the comment post itself, that it is actually quite unpleasant to read. There is also a plethora of assumptions regarding the nature and value of art, many of which I also find unpleasant. I would sincerely hope that any emotional background to the experience of the exhibition would not mar and influence the creation of an intellectually coherent response.
I will not actively attack some of the assumptions, as I don’t feel I need to. However, I will list them here as food for thought, along with some small comments.
i) The assumption that there is such a thing as a finished and fully developed “manifestation of artistic expression”. One can only comment on the efficacy of an artwork to express a known sentiment. If we are trying to access the sentiment or message through the artwork, then there is no way of knowing if we are correct or not.
ii) The presumption/assumption that these works that were “incomplete” were so because of a lack of motivation.
iii) The assumption that for art to be valuable, it has to enter into a dialogue with what has come before. I would suggest that NOT all art has to be deconstructive of what has come before. Art can poetically sensitise the audience to aspects of the world, it’s beauty, and how we perceive. That is not to say that it is created in a vacuum, however it does not need to explicitly acknowledge where it has come from - the audience themselves will be more or less aware of the context in the same way they are more or less aware of their own context within the world.