Nine installation artists present widely different views of “home”.
Before I read the programme notes I wrote: “This exhibition is a sunny day with a few clouds, and the clouds are not dark, they are white.”
Then I read the profound notes and I thought, “Holy paintbrush, I’ve missed the point!”
I returned to the site with the notes in my bag; but found great difficulty relating them to the installations in front, around and above me. So I returned to my original metaphor. It is mostly a fun exhibition. White clouds obscure the sun but bring no rain.
The exhibition highlights the work of nine “emerging” artists and has a theme of “home”, which is hard to find in much of the work.
Milijana Babic’s fun installation is based superficially on Alice in Wonderland.
Julia Clark has three large, pretty necklaces made of paper, fabric and found objects. One of them contains questions such as “What was the secret of Phoenician sea power?” Not something on my mind at the moment.
Thando Mama has a video of a naked black figure kneeling before a TV screen who transforms into an elderly black man talking to a young white man. The words are indistinct but I caught, “my body, my mind, my culture – it’s about me”. That old chestnut “me” as a preoccupation fades and you have to go around the corner to catch a video of a slouching young man being interviewed, but here no words are decipherable.
Kelly Tuck has a stark white room with a painted window and a real rocking chair. It’s vaguely disturbing in its sterility. A white cloud.
Heath Nash offers three round plastic lampshades, with lit globes, lying on the floor. Not much of an idea of home.
Mathew Hindley presents, at the end of a passage, what looks like a big speedometer, ticking off the kilometres. Presumably he lives in a car.
Johnny Foreigner and Judith Brigg showed a fine sense of humour with a rip-off of TV soaps. A series of photographs were linked by a cement block and contained items such as a bar of Lifebuoy soap, Sunlight dishwashing liqiud, a loaf of bread, a dishcloth—
Colleen Alborough had the installation that appealed most to the little children who came with their parents: a room full of birdseed about 10 centimetres deep. This was allied to a video that was intriguing, but ultimately inaccessible, of a bird that transforms into a girl and bursts into and out of flame.
I think this exhibition is well worth visiting, if you don’t take it too seriously, and don’t search too diligently for insights into “home”. Bear in mind that these are young, emerging, artists. – ECN-Cue
Homing In is on display at the Albany History Museum