Fortyfive Downstairs Emerging Artist Finalist
Proud to have been selected as a finalist with an honourable mention in the Fortyfive Downstairs gallery Emerging Artist Prize July 2024.
Content note: This work of art includes references to suicide and confronting content which some people may find challenging and disturbing.
This work rises from overwhelming pain to demonstrate the courage, endurance and resilience of survivors, and protest the destructive myths surrounding Anzac and the Military Industrial Complex.
Philosopher Jean-Francois Lyotard wrote that postmodernism began with the questioning of metanarratives, and that ‘petit recits’ offer alternative narratives to the traditionally held beliefs which underpin our society. In my life, I’ve seen the destructive nature of the Military Industrial Complex, including the injury and suicide of my veteran husband.
After he died, I destructively intervened with the mountainous archive of memorabilia I inherited. I intravenously dripped oil-like-ink stains on his picture-perfect portrait. A tormented face appears where I burned his Army squadron flag. I harnessed the power of violent acts in creative practice to convey resistance to cultural and national myths reinforcing Anzac. Through this process my inner turmoil was reformed and transformed. By breaking the archive, I artistically explored how destruction is generative.
As I made, I realised that personal trauma is inseparable from its social and political context. In the news I witness how the Military Industrial Complex, on a grand political scale, is killing tens of thousands of children whilst most of the world accepts a more reassuring metanarrative of ‘the right to defend.’ My personal experience of war and its aftermath amplifies my voice as I join in fearlessly demanding ‘cease fire now!’Read more at:
