Canberra Contemporary Art Space

Spat+Loogie - New!Shop Friday 5 May

2006-05-15T09:13:00.000+10:00

Natalie Thomas & Kristen Phillips - Picassol

2006-05-09T10:09:00.000+10:00

Dysfunctional Feed Performance

2006-04-22T14:24:00.000+10:00

Sydney collective Dysfunctional Feed performed at CCAS on Friday 21 April and Saturday 22 April.

Public Forum for Social Captial

2006-03-22T16:52:00.000+11:00

Saturday 25 March @ 2pm
Canberra Contemporary Art Space presents a public forum to coincide with the exhibition Social Capital curated by Lisa Byrne. Public housing, social policy and civic tradition are some of the issues which will be discussed by a distinguished panel of artists, writers, academics and public officials.
Panel members include:
Deb Pippen - Tenants Union ACT
Kerrie Tucker - ACT Shelter
Martyn Jolly - Artist and Academic
Eric Martin - Architect
Trish McDonald - YWCA

For more details ph 6247 0188 or check out the website www.ccas.com.au

Social Capital is a project developed by Lisa Byrne for Canberra Contemporary Art Space (CCAS) exploring the concept of social capital in the ACT. It follows on from CCAS’s former projects in both the gallery and wider ACT community focused on the contemporary negotiation of art and social space. Previous projects include Canberra/Brasilia (2001), Motel (1999), The Home Front (2002), housecosy (2002) and Beautiful Home (1997).

Public Housing in the ACT has a dynamic and distinctive history unlike other states and territories of Australia. Indeed much of the early public housing in the ACT was for Government Appointees, relocating to the Capital through a diversity of incentive schemes.

Social capital investigates the relationship between civic tradition, democratic participation and associational activity in the ACT using Public Housing as its impetus.

Social Capital is an exhibition comprising work by seven artists working across a variety of forms. In individual ways each artist examines the role of social capital in our local community relative to a contemporary social history of public housing in Canberra.. Canberra’s history of civic tradition and public policy forms a background to these artist’s work.

Social Capital’s involvement of writers, documentary filmmakers, animators, poster makers, photographers, journalists and social historians is specifically about ensuring an engaged democratic, associational discourse within the parameters of the overall project. Social Capital presents a diverse range of narratives about the subject of public housing, and engages contemporary art with recent social history.

New contact for Lisa Byrne

2006-03-22T15:36:00.000+11:00

Lisa has taken up her post as Director of Monash University Faculty Gallery

Her new email address is

Gallery@ArtDes.monash.edu.au

Manuka Floor Talk

2006-03-02T10:38:00.000+11:00

Trevelyan Clay will give a floor talk for his show, Spendin Time on an Image, at 12:30pm Friday March 3. The last day of the exhibition is Sunday March 5.
For more information about Spendin Time on an Image see the website: www.ccas.com.au

Artists Talks on Saturday 4 February

2006-02-07T12:18:00.000+11:00

A large crowd descended upon CCAS for the opening of The Great Diving Range and Jenny Lawrence's Common Unnatural Beauty for some art and cold beer on a very warm Friday evening. The Artists' floor talks following the opening were a great success with all of the artists taking the time to attend. Joan Ross was here (from Sydney) for the whole week leading up to the install, The Anti-Monument Coalition came up from Melbourne on the Thursday. Helen Johnson (Melbourne) and Tony Albert (Brisbane) arrived on Friday and the locals, Scott Morrison and Waratah were in and out of the gallery throughout the week. Luis Martinez came down from Sydney for the talks on Saturday. The artists mainly focussed on the processes and inspiration for their work and some interesting connections between the works were made, especially in relation to the recent Cronulla riots and the resultant saturation of images from the media. Mark Hislop wrote the catalogue essay for the exhibition (available at CCAS $3 members, $5 non-members) which also focuses on the riots and examines how this event has encouraged a questioning of the notions of national identity and culture.

Common Unnatural Beauty

2006-01-31T17:42:00.001+11:00

Cube Gallery
Jenny Lawrence

opening 3 February @ 6pm

image
Jenny Lawrence
Common Unnatural Beauty (detail)
2006

The Great Dividing Range

2006-01-31T17:09:00.000+11:00

summerwonderland
2006
Scott Morrison

The Great Dividing Range
curated by Lisa Byrne
Luis Martinez
The Anti-Monument Coalition
Waratah Lahy
Joan Ross
Helen Johnson
Scott Morrison
Tony Albert

opening Friday 3 February @ 6pm

Moving On.....

2006-01-31T16:30:00.000+11:00

Canberra Contemporary Art Space’s Director Lisa Byrne tends her resignation.

After six years with Canberra Contemporary Art Space(CCAS) Lisa Byrne has decided to take up new challenges as Director of the Monash University Faculty of Art and Design Gallery in Melbourne. In addition to this appointment Lisa will be completing an Asialink Residency in Japan during May-August 2006 to work on the Echigo-Tsumari Triennial with its Artist Director Fram Kitagawa of the Art Front Gallery Tokyo.

Commencing with CCAS in August 1999 as Exhibition Program Manager for 2.5 years then as Director for 4 years Lisa brought much enthusiasm and dedication to the Canberra contemporary art scene during her tenure. She has actively contributed to various Management Boards in extension of her role at CCAS demonstrating her commitment to the vitality and success of important not-for-profit cultural organisations based in Canberra.

In addition to advocating for artistic development for artists in the ACT specifically, Lisa achieved valuable renovations and gallery infrastructure improvements. Over the last two years Lisa lead CCAS through significant internal organisational change resulting from the federal government’s Visual Arts and Craft Strategy. The increased funding CCAS received resulted in the establishment of eight studio residencies per annum, raising artist fees to the recommended levels of the National Association of the Visual Arts, and increased staff levels to meet the growing attention to and demands on CCAS’s program. In all, Lisa has overseen in excess of 300 exhibitions during her Directorship. Her last curatorial project with CCAS will be Social Capital opening 6pm Thursday March 2006. Appropriately, this exhibition focuses on the unique history of Canberra’s public housing with newly commissioned works by six contemporary artists living and working in the ACT.

On behalf of the CCAS Board of Management and staff I wish to thank Lisa for her zeal and passion for the advancement of CCAS and all our very best for her future curatorial career.

Christopher Chapman
Chair
Canberra Contemporary Art Space
Board of Management
February 2006

2005 CCAS Contemporary Art Award

2005-11-26T15:28:00.000+11:00

Congratulations to Penelope Richardson
winner of the 2005 CCAS Contemporary Art Award

Penelope's work Confess - Fight City 2005 was selected from a short list of 31 artists from ACT, Victoria, NSW, Northern Territory and Western Australia by Dr Charles Merewether ( Director - 2006 Biennale of Sydney). Over 150 artists submitted work for the Award

Penelope Richardson
Confess - Fight City 2005
lambda print
100 x 100cm

Richardson is interested in "exploring a human response to the representations of reality using the poetics of drawing and photography". The work suggests that as the village globalises the significance of ones' own community, the role of the individual in that community comes into question."Using the aesthetics of decay I am attempting to explore and intentionally blur the boundary between the real of the 'media' and the imagined of the individual"

The Helen Maxwell Award went to Waratah Lahy for her work Found 2004

Dr Charles Merewether made mention of two works for commendation.
Keith Wong (NSW) w.pages 2005
and
Fleur Summers(VIC) R + D 2005

2005 CCAS Contemporary Art Award

2005-11-25T17:41:00.000+11:00

The winner of the 2005 CCAS Contemporary Art Award
will be announced tonight by Dr Charles Merewether

Finalists

Stuart Bailey (ACT)
Surya Bajchandra(NSW)
Katalin Bayer + Ferenc Varga (NSW)
Deirdre Brennan(NSW)
Maria Buchner (NSW)
Steven Cavanagh (NSW)
Adam Cullen + Cash Brown(NSW)
Carla Cescon (NSW)
Trevelyan Clay(ACT)
Marcel Cousins(VIC)
Nicola Dickson (ACT)
John Douglas (NSW)
Olivia Dowling (VIC)
Kirsten Farrell(NSW)
Denise Ferris(NSW)
Gilgi (WA)
Kate Just (VIC)
Kitpi (WA)
Waratah Lahy (ACT)
Lizzie Newman(VIC)
Sarina Noordhuis-Fairfax (ACT)
Omborrin (WA)
Izabel Pluta (NSW)
Penelope Richardson (VIC)
Joan Ross (NSW)
Catriona Stanton (NT)
Fleur Summers (VIC)
Justin Trendall (NSW)
Siliva Velez (ACT)
Beverly Veasey (NSW)
Keith Wong (NSW)

Peter Newman

2005-11-25T17:00:00.000+11:00

CCAS Cube2

Peter Newman

Rosebud

Plus

The Diametrically Opposed Man

25 November - 18 December 2005

Orson Welles’ first feature film - which he directed, produced, and co-wrote, as well as playing the title role - proved to be his most important and influential work, a ground-breaking drama loosely based on the life of William Randolph Hearst which is frequently cited as the finest American film ever made. In contrast, ‘Rosebud’ is a piece of charged abstraction, stripped bare of all resemblance to the narrative cinema typified by Welles’ work. Nearby is ‘The Diametrically Opposed Man’ (played by Aidan Roberts), which, like Rosebud, attempts to stagger binary contradictions through resonating discrete elements in temporal proximity, ultimately inviting us to reconsider our experience of time, affect and intentionality.   

Thanks: Aidan Roberts, Kronos Quartet
Peter Newman

Demelza Sherwood

2005-11-03T10:42:00.000+11:00

CCAS Manuka
19 Furneaux St, Manuka ACT

Demelza Sherwood
Gormley's School for Lion Tamers

3 -13 November 2005
Opening 6pm Thursday 3 November, 2005

Roll up! Roll up! to Gormley’s School For Lion Tamers.

In the tradition ofToulouse-Lautrec and the Mabel Stark Lion and Tiger Training School For Women,a troupe of paper dolls preen plastic smiles and blackened teeth.

See the spectacle of freaks montaged from a 1930s Play Pictorial and the acrobats who missed their tricks.

See Drawings! Strongmen, aerialists and wire walkers flit and stain the paper. The Siamese twins get funky with The Flash. The bearded lady is as beautiful as ever, and the everyday is grotesque and compelling seen through the lens of this sideshow spectacle.

Kate Just

2005-10-23T10:13:00.000+10:00

CCAS Gorman House
Ainslie Ave, Braddon

Kate Just
Boundary(LOVE)

21 October - 19 November, 2005
Opening 6pm 21 October, 2005

Kate Just’s recent practice has included knitted sculptures, installations and video which combine notions of gender, family and history to form psychologically potent environments. In Boundary(LOVE), Kate Just presents a work one year long in the making. A knitted boundary hedge using hand dyed wool on a cardboard base Boundary(LOVE) spans 5 metres by 2 metres. “The “hedge” work was originally inspired by an interest in the way people create boundaries to contain what they own and cultivate. Early gardens were enclosed for practical reasons – privacy, exclusion of pests, and to limit cultivated ground. By carefully constructing and planning a boundary hedge, giving it a unique form or investing in it’s beauty, the person contained within sends a message to the outside world. When creating the “hedge”, I recalled a childhood of dark Decembers in frozen Connecticut, USA (my birthplace), where my family used to pile into a maroon minivan and drive through town, observing elaborately conceived Christmas messages out of lights, decorations and shrubbery in neighbours’ front yards. My love-hedge is a nod to poetic messages and the hopeful and strangely artful gestures made from within suburban and domestic surrounds.” Kate Just

Al Munro

2005-10-23T10:00:00.000+10:00

CCAS Gorman House
Ainslie Ave, Braddon

Al Munro
Blue print for a green day

21 October - 19 November 2005
Opening 6pm Friday 21 October, 2005

Al Munro’s current project Blue print for a green day at Canberra Contemporary Art Space reminds us that the world is an amazing place. Drawing on the relationship between biological and cultural languages of the past, Munro creates interesting aesthetic possibilities gleaned from artefacts of plants. Comprised of a myriad of permutations, Munro uses traces, remains, models and relics of oak leaves, sheep, grids, and pixels to produce new artefacts for a museum of flora and fauna of the imagination. In a very peculiar way Munro maps the world of plants and animals through pictorially based analytical reductionism. Devoid of the usual politic associated with contemporary biological and cultural diversity issues, Munro’s specimens rouse our contemporary curiosities.

Blue print for a green day is the outcome the artist’s residency in 2003 at the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, London. During this period Munro examined many of the raw materials housed in the Economic Botany Collection. This collection, designated to the human use of plants from around the world houses a variety of objects includes artefacts made from; plant material, food, medicines, utensils to social activities and clothing. Plant materials include things such as pickled fruits, dried leaf specimens, and seeds. Dated from the first official Director, Sir William Hooker in 1847, along with the founding contributions of botanist, explorer Sir Joseph Banks, the collection currently contains some 78,000 objects. Uniquely, all objects are classified taxonomically and the majority are determined to a genus level and over 80% down to species.[1] Importantly for Munro the Economic Botany Collection remains open today.
[1] See http://rbgkew.org.uk for a detailed description of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew.

Lisa Byrne

Angela Dufty and Camille Serisier

2005-10-22T02:14:00.000+10:00

CCAS Cube

Angela Dufty and Camille Serisier
1 + 1 = 3
a modular collaboration

21 Oct - 19 Nov, 2005
Opening 6pm Friday 21 October 2005

1+1=3 is a modular collaboration by Angela Dufty and Camille Serisier investigating the intricacies of shared experience.

Using materials sourced from their personal environments Serisier and Dufty create modular stage like re-productions of shared experiences. Each module becomes a piece of the set; a drawing a backdrop, a tiny sculpture a prop. Scale and form are manipulated as the viewer is asked to suspend their disbelief and enter the artist’s personal realm.

A scene of life can be recreated and abstracted to reveal what only the eyes of another can share. A dialogue is constructed within the artist’s collaborative process, and extrinsically as the viewer negotiates the artist’s travelled territory, engaging with the artist’s private realm and the world we think we know.

Clare Martin

2005-10-21T10:30:00.000+10:00

CCAS Manuka
19 Furneaux St,
Manuka ACT

Clare Martin
The Geller Collection
20 Oct - 30 Oct, 2005
Opening 6pm Thursday 20 October, 2005

The history of art is also the history of ideas. Artist Clare Martin presents “The Geller Collection”, an exhibition of objects inspired by paranormal practitioner Uri Geller, and by the efforts of scientists to understand what was happening. The most reliable talent Geller displayed was the ability to bend spoons by stroking them, although he also professed powers of telepathy and psychokinesis. He was also willing to co-operate with scientists who tried to measure and explain these phenomena.

Clare Martin instead takes her approach from pataphysics[1, and has assembled a collection of objects which suggest various explanations for the bending spoons. This includes arguments borrowed from logic, evolution, intelligent design and the philosophy of science. Martin sets out various hypotheses and tests them in ways which challenge our ordinary understanding of everyday materials and objects to the limits of plausibility. She has also devised a prototype stroking machine in an attempt to reproduce the Geller effect.
The exhibition also includes explanatory text panels with information largely sourced from Geller’s website, http://www.uri-geller.com/. The artist regrets that Mr Geller was unavailable to open the show.

This exhibition replaces the advertised show “Screening the Buddha” which has had to be postponed due to events beyond the artist’s control.

[1] The French absurdist concept of a philosophy or science dedicated to studying what lies beyond the realm of metaphysics, intended as a parody of the methods and theories of modern science and often expressed in nonsensical language.