Working with ephemera and ‘objets trouves’ I create narratives that allow a range of interpretations but work within the tenets of fine art seeking to find within the compositions, form, balance, colour, and the tensions within the spectrum plus playing with language and its ever changing meanings.
As an artist my interest in collage and assemblage has been triggered by my exposure to the German and French Dada artists, with Kurt Schwitters, Georges Hugnet and Marcel Duchamp as influences. Plus, the Pop artists of the 20th century the Englishman Richard Hamilton, and the assemblages of the Americans Joseph Cornell and Robert Rauschenberg with the Australians Rosalie Gascoigne and Richard Larter as further inspirations.
Recognising the place of the magazine in Western Culture through my interest in Cultural Theory, I began to appreciate the power of the images and texts that are a part of everyday existence. From a Post-modernist perspective, my aim is to destabilize and contest ideology through the use of advertising images, objects from Popular Culture and text that asks for different readings through an open mind as my belief is that art’s responsibility is to inspire on many levels.
Collage and Assemblage allows the combination of disparate images and room for the expression of the symbolic which I appreciate can have many meanings and allow the viewer a range of interpretations thus stimulating comment and hopefully questions. What I ask of the viewer is to allow their imagination to find readings within the Text where Post-modernist irony, humour, Feminism, politics, Gender, Culture and Language find expression and are meant as stimulus for the unconscious and therefore the reappraisal of Culture and the human condition.
Education
2009 Diploma Australian Studies, Flinders University
Cultural Heritage Management, Sociology and Australian Studies
2008 Masters of Arts, Griffith University Gold Coast
Cultural Studies
Media, Producing Culture, Society and Culture.
Offer: Flinders University Honours Film and Australian Studies 2006
2006 Bachelor of Arts, Flinders University
Australian Cultural Studies and Film
Australian Studies, Film, Media, Indigenous Culture and Art, Gender Studies, Cultural Theory, Tourism, English and Narrative.
2005 University of Adelaide
Art History, Modern and Contemporary Art.
2004 University of Western Sydney
Cultural Theory, English, Film, Fine Arts, Sculpture, Art History and Australian Art.
MAPS-Media Arts Production Skills
Certificate IV
Hamilton College, SA 2000-1
Through directing, producing and writing scripts, creating sets, developed skills in film making.
Videos
“Little Aussie Screamer” a comedy situated in the 1950s revealed, through the tensions on a wedding night, the couple’s constructed identities.
“Pray” showed the anxiety a woman feels when she is stalked but the empowerment when she takes action.
“Better Luck Next Time” reflected the problems of dating after a relationship break up.
“Lights Out” looked at the ramifications of betrayal on a long term friendship when a wife finds revealing photographs of her best friend in amongst her deceased husband’s effects.
Work Experience
2007 Art Galleries Schubert, Marina Mirage, Surfers’ Paradise, Queensland.
2002 Artist exhibitor at Fringe.
1997 As a director of Magic Mountain, a theme park in South Australia, produced a strategic plan and marketing proposal.
1996 Designed, promoted and launched a nightclub in the Metropolis Hotel, Adelaide.
1996 Co-ordinated and led a community response to the use of Portrush Road as a major thoroughfare for B-Doubles.
1995 Committee member of Linden Park Primary School, SA
