Photography | Brian Rope
Hot/Cold
| Various Artists: Abby Ching, Alan Charlton, Amanda Pratt, Andrea Bryant,
Andrew Morgan, Bailey Corazza, Brian Rope, Caroline Lemerle, David Bermingham,
Eva Schroeder, Fiona Bowring-Greer, Ian Russell, Jane Duong, Jenny Dettrick,
Jordan Stokes, Kathy Leo, Marie Lund, Trevor Lund, Marzena Wasikowska, Richard
Glover, Susan Henderson, Tessa Ivison, Virginia Walsh, and Yvette Perine.
Photo Access | 13 May – 5 June
Disclaimer:
the author of this review has two works in the exhibition but received no
payment for it.
Each year PhotoAccess invites entries for a members’ exhibition. The 2021 show Hot/Cold sought responses to the idea that we have entered a time of extremes – seasonal, climactic and perhaps emotional. It complements two other solo exhibitions simultaneously in the gallery, both tackling climate transformation issues: Avalanche by Sari Sutton which looks at seasonal variations producing snow, and Black Summer 2020: the Aftermath by Ben Kopilow which explores landscape after that Black Summer. Those other shows have been reviewed separately here.
All
PhotoAccess Members were welcome to submit up to two entries. All entries
meeting the submission criteria were included in the gallery exhibition and an online
gallery. Works were able to be in any photographic medium but could not have
been previously exhibited in a solo or group exhibition. Amongst the mostly inkjet,
digital and Type C prints, it was particularly good to see a sun print on silk
by Virginia Walsh, Giclee prints by Andrea Bryant, liquid silver gelatin prints
on plates by Jane Duong, Polaroid instant film works by Jenny Dettrick, and a
resin coated darkroom print by Abby Ching. This demonstrates that PhotoAccess is
supporting a wide range of contemporary photo-media practices.
It was also great to see Susan Henderson providing some poetry for the catalogue entry about an image of little girls waiting for ice-cream on a hot day whilst the air was filled with smoke and embers:
Baking heat of day
Azure sky, breathe in, breathe out
Ancient time and place
The exhibition catalogue tells us that “Each twelve months journey around the sun brings us the glorious change of the seasons, from the basking heat of January to the frozen breath of July, and all the shades between. But recently, this variation seems to have grown more intense, bringing devastating bushfires, an unusually cool, rainy summer and a shrinking snow season.”
“This disorder re-shapes our world and our lives, changing the plants and animals around us, provoking us to build new places to live and altering how we spend our days. These changes also impact how we feel about ourselves and participate in our relationships, alternately separating us from and bringing us closer to each other.”
So, the question is: what does it mean to be Hot/Cold? In my view not all works have addressed that question. On the other hand, some have looked at the question in innovative ways.
Amongst the most interesting works are those by Jane Duong, Andrea Bryant and Jenny Dettrick. Duong’s because they are on circular plates and their exploration of the ideas of home, dreams and memory makes the viewer think about their relationship to the theme. Bryant’s because they are Giclee prints of destructive cyclical algae events.
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Jane Duong - Heart aches for home, 2020 |
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| Andrea Bryant - Blue-Green Dreaming 2, 2020 |
Dettrick's works are, perhaps, the cleverest response to the Hot/Cold theme. One of her Polaroids was developed above a sizzling hot frypan and the other was placed under ice in a freezer for 30 minutes.
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Jenny Dettrick - Of Fire, 2021 |
Tessa Ivison’s digital prints resulted from long exposures combined with movement as a way of interpreting her environment.
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Tessa Ivison - Atmos, 2020 |
Eva Schroeder has created her image using, as her subject, a woman who has lived through the extremes of 2020 with serious underlying health conditions whilst using a deep love of performance art to create an adventurous life.
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Eva Schroeder - The Phoenix, 2020 |
One of the best-known of the exhibitors is Marzena Wasikowska. Her landscape is a response to our environmental predicament.
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| Marzena Wasikowska - The Gap, 2020 |
This, and the accompanying, exhibitions are well worth visiting.
This review is also on the author's own blog here.
