Master o

f Fine A

rt & D

esign

Exhibition

Diane Foster

Chris Hamnett

Aaron Hutchins

Brett Meeker

Meaghan Roberts

22-26 JUNE 2012

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My project investigates the effects of mining on the landscape and the paradoxical beauty of nature transformed by industry. I am intrigued by the relationship between the immensity of industrial buildings and the minutiae not always visible.

I search for signs of the ravages of time and history that are relentlessly worked on by natural and chemical elements. There is an apparent lack of order and predictability in these areas, but always the possibility of discovering beauty in some quiet or forgotten corner.

My vistas of industrial sites cannot be called ‘pretty’, yet I perceive something eerily beautiful and haunting in them. I bring small things into focus, enabling the minute and large to co-exist side by side. My works can appear to be enigmatic but, behind every image of industrial desolation, a hidden message can lie in the marks, scratches and signs of past human activity.

Images from the West Coast use a medley of surfaces, shapes and colours reminiscent of that landscape of copper and iron ore deposits. Using Photoshop, I manipulate points of view, exaggerating angles to emphasise scale and create spatial tension. This gives a heightened sense of power and strength. Colours, in particular, are given an almost toxic, psychedelic depth for more dramatic effect.

My images of manufactured landscapes become metaphors for a dilemma between attraction and repulsion. I want my audience to feel uneasy, to enter a world beyond the threshold of visibility and to question and reflect on our complacency about man-made environmental degradation.

Master o

f Fine A

rt & D

esign

Exhibition

22-26 JUNE 2012

Prin

tmak

ing

Spent Cooling Tower

and Acid Plant Converter

2011

Archival Digital Print

143cm x 100cm

Conveyor Belt Transfer House

2011

Archival Digital Print

112cm x 80cm

Prince Lyell No.1 Shaft Headframe

2012

Archival Digital Print

112cm x 80cm

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Obsessive Compulsive Disorder is characterised by

the presence of recurring intrusive and unwanted

thoughts, images, or impulses – obsessions and

repetitive behavioural and mental rituals –

compulsions.

(Sane.org)

My project explores how having OCD can form

an approach to abstract painting. As a child I

was compelled to write numbers on pad paper.

Repetitively and for hours at a time I filled

out reams of paper. This early memory of my

condition has been the starting point for the

development of this body of work. I have taken to

the canvas as though it were a piece of pad paper.

At times I have adhered closely to the border

of the canvas and kept the numbers carefully

aligned and ordered, at other times

I have become totally absorbed by the process

and the ordered rhythm loses step slightly.

Through the use of various strategies such as;

repetition, obscuring, revealing, the immediacy

of fluorescent orange paint and scale, these

paintings explore the subjective experience

of my condition.

Master o

f Fine A

rt & D

esign

Exhibition

22-26 JUNE 2012

Pain

ting

I’d better stop now or I’ll start repeating myself: Compulsive Abstraction

Untitled

Acrylic and oil paint on canvas

2012

182.88 x 152.4cm

Untitled

Acrylic paint and oilstick on canvas

2012

90 x 60cm

Untitled

Acrylic and oil paint on canvas

2012

182.88 x 152.4cm

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“Memory is never just a straightforward process of recording lest we forget and, even in the best equipped of minds, it can be a slippery mechanism”

Joan Gibbons (2007)

My project investigates the externalisation of

traumatic memories through the discursive

qualities of paint. Memories have the ability to be

both intrusive and illusive. They are not precise;

they are nebulous, pliable and ever changing.

Through the tactility of paint I have emphasised

this malleable quality of memory; and coupled

it with emotive colour and painterly gesture to

evoke tension and anxiety. I have engaged with

my childhood toys as a metaphor to allude to the

personal yet universal nature of this project.

The toys sit in a vacant space, where they

appear isolated and discarded. This isolation is

accentuated through the blurry depth of field

where the clouded and unrecognisable become

fragments and details of memories that have

dissolved away over time.

Master o

f Fine A

rt & D

esign

Exhibition

22-26 JUNE 2012

Pain

ting

Two smashed cars, red

Oil on canvas

2012

40.64cm x 50.8cm

Derailed train, front on

Oil on canvas

2012

40.64cm x 50.8cm

Two smashed cars,

side on, green

Oil on canvas

2012

40.64cm x 50.8cm

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The current vocabulary of road signs actively

and passively coerces and demands compliance.

Words, numbers and symbols serve to create

social order. These days, when driving, there are

an ever increasing number of things which have

to be filtered out, to comply with my father’s

admonishments to ‘watch the road and just drive’.

Ever changing speed limit signs are punctuated

by the ‘No’s’ – No parking, standing, left, right,

through, passing, etc., either as a word or a

symbol. And then there are permits, vouchers,

tickets, dockets and such.

If grasping the distinctions between these

Saussure-ian semiotic signifiers is, sometimes,

difficult for locals, understanding these can

remain an ‘impenetrable fog’ to some tourists.

Imagine searching for meaning and the varying,

and dangerous degrees of confusion, doubt, or

worse fatal certainty experienced by our casual

car encased visitors.

For many it’s ‘Danger at every turn’ or for others,

it’s the adopted ‘she’ll be right mate… I am safe

in my rent-a-bubble’ attitude; both are hazards.

I expect theirs is something like the emotional

insecurity we will all feel when confronted with

an unaffordable and carless post oil reality for

which few of us are adequately informed or

prepared.

The printing plates for the SIGNs series came to

me via transport accidents. With some fidelity to

their original purposes I have re-purposed them

to speak as warnings and admonishments for

some futuristic and seldom seriously considered

un fossil fuelled “Brave New World” in which our

social conditioning could be turned toward better

considered relationships with the land, place

and each other.

Master o

f Fine A

rt & D

esign

Exhibition

22-26 JUNE 2012

Prin

tmak

ing

SIGNs, No Standing, CCTV

2012

Etching

220mm x 440mm

SIGNs, No Standing,

Social Guilt, 2012

Etching

220mm x 440mm

SIGNs, No Standing,

Spotlight, 2012

Etching

220mmx 440mm

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This body of work is an exploration into visual

representations of imaginative environments in

oil paint, informed by existing spaces. Pattern,

colour and texture are the fundamental structures

of the environment and are emphasised through

the plasticity of paint. Incorporated into a view the

pattern and fluidity of the paint create a surreal

environment straddling the representational and

the sublime. The morphing and colliding of paint

represents and assimilates patterns in coral, sea

sponge, shells and moss. In contrast they also

bring up connotations to mines, oil spills and

chemical runoffs.

The combination of pours and washes with

rendered forms and heightened colour create

a quality reminiscent of fantasy and science

fiction by alluding to an alien or apocalyptic

environment. The spontaneity of the paint creates

an illusion of potential movement yet is ultimately

contained by the frame and also by the control

and manipulation by the human hand.

The combination of pours and rendered forms

within these picturesque views creates an illusion

of space connecting the familiar with the other

worldly. Shifts between a two dimensional

surface and an illusionistic sense of depth explore

a fantastical re-interpretation of the natural

environment.

The paintings create a sense of awe and wonder

with hints of the catastrophic. Toxic slime oozes

from a break in the Earth or a vale of malevolent

darkness slowly blankets a valley. The paintings

offer a moment of perpetual change and constant

flux captured in time.

Master o

f Fine A

rt & D

esign

Exhibition

22-26 JUNE 2012

Pain

ting

Balancing Act

oil on canvas, 2011-2012

110cm x 125cm

Apocalypse

acrylic and oil on canvas,

2012

182cm x 244cm

Aurora

oil on canvas, 2012

91cm x 122cm