Pieces of Practice

Pieces of Practice | Articulate Project Space Project | Lodz Art and Documentation Festival

Booklet of drawings from my time working in the Articulate Project Space. As part of Articulate's Project Space Project documentation was sent to the Lodz Art and Documentation Festival in Poland in April 2012. The book has since returned.

Cardboard, Paper, Pen, Cotton, Label

See previous post on Articulate's Project Space Project here

Paper. Sound. Fable | Sound Object Collaboration

Alex and I have been working on a new set of objects and sound pieces during our time at 107 Projects. We've co-authored a blog to document our process/progress.

Visit Paper. Sound. Fable.

'Melting Ice, Hanging Net' (details) | 107 Projects, Redfern

From Top: 'Domesticity', 'Melting Ice, Hanging Net' (details) File Boxes, Speakers, Wires, Masking Tape, Labels.

Domesticity

Domesticity is a fragment work that hangs somewhere between the exhibition and studio space. Inspired by the left over objects of Melting Ice, Hanging Net, and conversations with other artists on domestic chores, Alexandra's sounds of washing dishes, overhead aeroplanes, ukulele and washing machine evoke a space that is personal, commonplace and meditative, and links it to the sensibility of art works that are invariably 'left over'.

Domesticity audio by Alexandra Spence

Aeroplane, A washing machine cycle, Ukulele, Washing and stacking the dishes.

'Melting Ice, Hanging Net' | 107 Projects Redfern

Alex Spence and I will be installing our sound and object installation Melting Ice, Hanging Net at 107 Projects in Redfern.

Opens Thursday 2nd May at 6.00pm and goes to Sunday 12th May 2013. We will also be using some of the alcove as a studio to develop a new work.

More details at 107 Projects

Melting Ice, Hanging Net audio: Alexandra Spence

Clarinet, Ice melting and amp clicking in a cup of water, Mbira (thumb piano), A man in Varanasi (India) reciting a Hindu text, Fish frying in a pan.

'Melting Ice, Hanging Net' | de-installation details

Linen thread, found doilies, speakers, sea objects, cotton thread, hooks, sinkers, wire, Articulate floor boards.

'BLEND' | Articulate Project Space

'BLEND' | Alexander Jackson Wyatt, Ida Lawrence, Kathryn Ryan and Alexandra Spence

Open 11am - 5pm Fri 22nd - Sun 24th February 2013

6 - 8pm Friday 22 | Opening Party
Performances begin 6:30pm

2pm Sunday 24 | Public discussion between the exhibiting artists, their mentors/collaborators, Alison Clouston and Boyd, Christine Olsen and Alan Schacher, Articulate artists and the public.

BLEND is an exhibition and discussion of the cross-artform project at Articulate Project Space in 2012-13. Where by, young and emerging artists teamed up with established artists from other artistic fields to produce site specific works for the project space.

See more photos here

Photo: Peter Murphy

Melting Ice, Hanging Net

Kathryn's objects and Alex's sounds combine to form the installation Melting Ice, Hanging Net. Mentored by collaborators, visual artist Alison Clouston and musician Boyd, Alex and Kathryn were given the opportunity not only to work with a different artform but to partake in a collaborative process. Because of this Alex and Kathryn also benefited from the experience of the artist from their own field.

The work took shape from conversations on landscape, process, and materials, hooking into the similarities between the watery sounds of Alex and the sea objects of Kathryn, and the elongated beamed hanging space of Articulate. A defining part of the process was reflecting on the physical object elements of the the sound components (the wires and speakers) and integrating them within the body of the work.

Alex has captured and manipulated the found sounds of fish frying, ice melting and the overheard recitation of the Ramayana (a Hindu epic) by a man in Varanasi, and joined them with Clarinet and Mbrina samples. Kathryn has used found sea objects, and re-worked found doilies to catch and cradle the speakers for Alex's ephemeral sounds. the 'live' wires fall and snake along the floor imagining the space's desire to be both under the sea, fisherman's shack, and collector's curio study.

This project is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.

Cross-Art mentorship & collaboration | Articulate Project Space

From 2nd -14th October and 5th -18th November 2012

Collaborators visual artist Alison Clouston and musician Boyd are mentoring Alexandra Spence and Kathryn Ryan in Articulate Project Space.

See more photos here

Cotton thread, linen thread, hook, doily, speaker, wire, sea twig, sinker.

Cotton thread, linen thread, hook, doily, speaker, wire, sea weed, sinker.

This project is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.

'The small studio' | Gaffa Gallery

Visit The small studio

15 - 26 November 2012

Opening Thursday 15 November, 6-8pm

PLATFORM, Gaffa
281 Clarence St, Sydney CBD, NSW 2000
Tel: (02) 9283 4273 www.gaffa.com.au
Open: Mon - Fri 10am - 6pm, Sat 11am-5pm

The small studio was created to house object collections, arrangements and processes, and to be a movable, spatially modest working space. It is a place to hold the material thoughts of practice, and to put them in relationship to changing external surroundings. The small studio marks out an area for practice when space is scarce, and complements the documentation of my larger studio in Pieces of Practice.

The small studio was formed during a cross-art form mentor-ship at Articulate Project Space in Leichhardt, and was made possible by a generously donated packaging crate.

This small studio is actually a smaller small studio than the original started in Leichhardt – unfortunately that small studio was too large for the Gaffa stairway. As the idea behind the studio was that it be easily moved, the studio had to be re-sized. This encounter underlined the relative nature of smallness, the ephemeral nature of my work in general, and the limits that contribute towards defining a practice. So this is the small studio II, and I suppose, now that there are a couple of versions, it is possible there may be more.

This project is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.

'Selections from the Egg Room' | Coffs Harbour Regional Gallery

'Shell Egg' Photo: Michael Myers 2011

Contemporary works from Sydney College of the Arts

5th October - 10th November 2012

Coffs Harbour Regional Gallery

Cnr Coff and Duke Streets, Coffs Harbour NSW 2450

Tues - Sun 10am - 4pm

Selections from the ‘Egg Room’ are 5 objects taken from a larger pool of 24 objects. The found objects accumulated in my studio over a period of years, and the eggs grew. The eggs grew from the insides of other eggs. Plaster is a blank, stationary material, and is well suited to capture the shadowy insides of eggs. I’m not sure why, eggs or objects—I simply found myself collecting and making. There is a bower bird down the road who has a lovely collection of blue objects—feathers, bottle tops, plastic ribbons, and I wonder two things: Why blue, and what blue (other than feathers) did they collect before we put our blue plastic bits out there?

I suppose I wanted the insides of the eggs to come alive, for the objects to hatch them, or for the eggs to hatch objects. I wanted stories, weird but familiar object stories. I see them as Frankenstein eggs more that Fitcher’s Bird eggs—if Dr Frankenstein were more concerned with poetic rather than literal transubstantiation (and had a thing for birds).

The eggs and objects are quite delicately assembled. It has always been important for me that the process of assembling be conceptually or poetically exposed; as such these things are held together with mostly wax and string. They are tied, strung, wrapped and pinned, poised and balanced. They are easily toppled. They are precarious, reflective, and a little bit humorous.