New Graduates 2015 - Lake house Art Centre - Takapuna, Auckland
Initiate(s)
Samples- A collection of mixed media works from 6 graduate artists from 2014 EIT Ideaschool Bachelor in Visual Art and Design Programme.
©2015. Artworks and images. Susan Mabin.
Smother Nature
Opening reception: 15 June 2015 | 15:00-17:00 Exhibition: 18-21 June 2015 | 16:00-18:00 Other time by appointment
Venue: Listhus Gallery | Ægistgata 10, 625 Olafsfjordur, Iceland | www.listhus.com
Venue: Listhus Gallery | Ægistgata 10, 625 Olafsfjordur, Iceland | www.listhus.com
Having travelled across the world from New Zealand to stay in Ólafsfjörður for 2 months (May and June 2015) I was unable to bring my usual heavy materials of sculpture with me. Rather naively I thought that there might not be much rubbish up there on those northern shores but there was…and from this rubbish I found my materials.
As I worked with these ‘finds’ qualities like the colours, textures, and shapes interested me, but often the juxtapositions of materials would end up having an environmental content that touches on the rubbish problem that humans are creating. The resulting work from my time in Ólafsfjörður was exhibited at Listhus Gallery in June 2015.
Having travelled across the world from New Zealand to stay in Ólafsfjörður for 2 months (May and June 2015) I was unable to bring my usual heavy materials of sculpture with me. Rather naively I thought that there might not be much rubbish up there on those northern shores but there was…and from this rubbish I found my materials.
As I worked with these ‘finds’ qualities like the colours, textures, and shapes interested me, but often the juxtapositions of materials would end up having an environmental content that touches on the rubbish problem that humans are creating. The resulting work from my time in Ólafsfjörður was exhibited at Listhus Gallery in June 2015.
See page on Iceland Residency for further photos and artworks
Out in the open
ROT
23. 06. 2015 | 09:00-17:00 | Ketihús, Art Museum of Akureyri
This project involved multiple artists of varying disciplines getting together, brainstorming, and creating a work of art together in order to explore what collaborative and unplanned effort might lead to.http://www.rot-project.com/
But it wasn’t smart/en það var ekki klár
You have changed/ Þú hefur breytt
Im trying/im að reyna
Stop it/stöðva það
You have changed/ Þú hefur breytt
Im trying/im að reyna
Stop it/stöðva það
Unhinged 2015
In November 2015 I exhibited my 'Unhinged' work in Taupo along with some new work. This work is autobiographical. I had a story to tell that I needed to make sense of. As painful and challenging as some of the work was to create, by giving myself permission to explore the issue of domestic abuse (be it emotional, psychological, and/or physical), and then put it into the public arena, I wanted to raise awareness of a subject that is rarely talked about, that is often hidden behind the thin veneer of ‘home’ but is a significant problem facing our society today. The hidden becomes visible. With visibility there is hope for change.
Monuments to the Unmonumental
Monuments to the Unmonumental, 2015
Installation: concrete, PVC pipe, found metal and wood objects, birds’ nests, tree branches, paint
Dimensions variable
17 December 2015 – 11 February 2016
Artist statement:
Humans have been creating small to large monuments to themselves and to their gods for cultural, social and spiritual reasons for thousands of years. Whilst recently travelling in the United Kingdom I was struck by the number of grand and monumental statues in the cities. Monuments to great men who went to battle, conquered mountains, travelled the seas, tamed wild animals, tamed the people and tamed the land. Putting ourselves on pedestals, making ourselves greater / smarter / grander than what we are.
As we rush headlong in our human endeavours, disregarding nature and the very planet that enables us to exist, of which we are certainly not integral to its existence; killing one another in pointless ways for having different beliefs; exhausting its resources and poisoning the air, land and water – what becomes of all other life forms that exist on the planet with us? The size of the problem becomes monumental, too much to comprehend.
For the CORNER project, I wanted to create some monuments to things that we consider non-monumental; for instance, that tree we chop down because it blocks the sun or because its leaves block the gutter in the autumn. To the bird whose nest gets thrown to the ground and mowed over because birds mark the fruit or worse… eat it. To the life form that’s home is destroyed by the sprays we use to grow our food, and whose world then gets clogged up with the materials we use to package that food.
Small reminders, token gestures actually, non-grandiose reminders of what it means to share a planet with human(un-)kind.
Installation: concrete, PVC pipe, found metal and wood objects, birds’ nests, tree branches, paint
Dimensions variable
17 December 2015 – 11 February 2016
Artist statement:
Humans have been creating small to large monuments to themselves and to their gods for cultural, social and spiritual reasons for thousands of years. Whilst recently travelling in the United Kingdom I was struck by the number of grand and monumental statues in the cities. Monuments to great men who went to battle, conquered mountains, travelled the seas, tamed wild animals, tamed the people and tamed the land. Putting ourselves on pedestals, making ourselves greater / smarter / grander than what we are.
As we rush headlong in our human endeavours, disregarding nature and the very planet that enables us to exist, of which we are certainly not integral to its existence; killing one another in pointless ways for having different beliefs; exhausting its resources and poisoning the air, land and water – what becomes of all other life forms that exist on the planet with us? The size of the problem becomes monumental, too much to comprehend.
For the CORNER project, I wanted to create some monuments to things that we consider non-monumental; for instance, that tree we chop down because it blocks the sun or because its leaves block the gutter in the autumn. To the bird whose nest gets thrown to the ground and mowed over because birds mark the fruit or worse… eat it. To the life form that’s home is destroyed by the sprays we use to grow our food, and whose world then gets clogged up with the materials we use to package that food.
Small reminders, token gestures actually, non-grandiose reminders of what it means to share a planet with human(un-)kind.