The conservator’s public image is most likely of someone cleaning an old painting with a cotton wool swab in a studio with classical music playing. However, art conservation — particularly contemporary art conservation — calls for an innovative and creative approach to the unique challenges presented by contemporary art display. Preparing fragile and complex art…
Continue reading » “Getting ready for bed: Contemporary art conservation”
‘Murun’, a Wiradjuri word meaning breath or life, and the English word ‘murmur’, meaning a low recurring sound or soft voices, are terms born far from each other — one long of this land, and one newly spoken here — but converge in untitled (giran) 2018. This major installation by artist Jonathan Jones is the…
Continue reading » “2000 separate sculptures are woven together with air”
This cliff in Chalk Fall 2018 (illustrated) seems solid, like the massive wall of a fortress, however on closer inspection, we see the rough waves churning beneath, and realise the cliff-face is giving way, falling into the ocean. Tacita Dean’s monumental chalkboard drawing evokes the famous White Cliffs of Dover which are eroding evermore swiftly…
Continue reading » “Subject of chalkboard drawing also composed of chalk”
We’re struck by the monumental scale and startling realism of Ron Mueck’s In bed 2005 (illustrated), then — almost voyeuristically — we are compelled to move closer to inspect the detailed texture of the figure’s hair, her translucent skin, and almost pulsing veins. Stepping back, her apprehensive facial expression and seemingly vulnerable state of being…
Continue reading » “Apprehensive & vulnerable: ‘In Bed’ by Ron Mueck”
Long fascinated by the air, Argentinian-born, Berlin-based artist Tomás Saraceno has created a major new commission — a mesmerising suspended installation — Drift: A cosmic web of thermodynamic rhythms 2022 (illustrated). Saraceno’s Drift engages the poetic and imaginative potential of air. The spheres are part transparent and part reflective; some float above the viewer at…
Connected lengths of duct punctuated by vents crisscross a room. Up close, it becomes clear the network is channelling air as the turbine ventilators spin and comes to life as a breathing system, wondrous for its unexpected industrial intrusion into the gallery. Nancy Holt ‘Ventilation System’ at GOMA First conceived in 1985, Nancy Holt’s Ventilation…
Continue reading » “Site-specific artwork makes visible the ducted air we rely on”
We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the land on which the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art stands and recognise the creative contribution First Australians make to the art and culture of this country.