Wanderlust an exhibition by PressNorth Printmakers

Wanderlust by PressNorth printmakers

I recently flew to Brisbane with the assistance of Townsville City Council, Grants for Excellence in Cultural Development, to help with the installation of Wanderlust, an exhibition by PressNorth Printmakers at the Judith Wright Centre, Brisbane.

Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts, Brisbane

The project was a collaboration between PressNorth Printmakers, Umbrella Studio of Contemporary Arts, Flying Arts Alliance and the Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts. The Wanderlust exhibition comprises of 27 framed prints by 21 members of PressNorth Printmakers.

Ben Werner leading the Flying Arts team of volunteers

It was a pleasure and a unique professional development opportunity for both Angela Cheung, from Umbrella Studio, and myself to work with Ben Werner, an industry leader of exhibition installation in Queensland. Ben lead the team of staff and volunteers from both Flying Arts and the Judith Wright Centre at a cracking pace to produce an elegant finish.

Theatre lighting used to light the exhibition of prints

Wanderlust is displayed in a converted performing arts theatre at the Judith Wright Centre and has large windows leading directly onto Brunswick St offering passers by a glimpse of the exhibition 24hrs a day. The walls are painted a dramatic black and with the use of barn lights to frame each print individually they have created an amazing visual effect, you are not aware of anything else in the gallery space but the artwork.

Volunteers installing Hannah Murray & my collaborative prints 'Awkward Orchid #1-4

Hannah Murray and I have collaborated on a new suite of prints for inclusion in the Wanderlust exhibition. The four prints are a combination of collagraph, etching, drypoint and hand colouring. Titled 'Awkward Orchid #1-4', they are 32 x 22cm, and an edition of 5 with 1 AP each. They can be purchased through Umbrella Studio of Contemporary Arts

Wanderlust by PressNorth Printmakers

The exhibition was officially opened by Judy Watson at the Judith Wright Centre, Brisbane, on the evening of Tuesday 21 October 2014.

Wanderlust by PressNorth Printmakers

Flying Arts CEO, Stephen Clarke kicked off the proceedings speaking about the collaboration  between the three arts organisations, PressNorth Printmakers, Umbrella Studio of Contemporary Arts and Flying Arts. I was invited to speak after Judy Watson about PressNorth Printmakers. In my speech I highlighted the importance of working in partnership with arts organisations in our region and beyond. PressNorth Printmakers do not have a headquarters to call home, relying on working in partnership to hold exhibitions and run workshops for our members.

Wanderlust by PressNorth Printmakers

PressNorth Printmakers is a not-for-profit artist-run-initiative promoting innovative printmaking, fostering excellence, inspiration and transferable skills engaging with local, national and international communities.  Its members are a diverse group of professional, mid career, emerging artists, tertiary and other education personal, art workers, curators, studio managers and enthusiasts with a majority living in Townsville, although we also have members from Mackay, Cairns and Brisbane.

To view the full exhibition click here 

To read about Angela Cheung's experience of our trip to Brisbane to install Wanderlust click on the link http://umbrella.org.au/blog/

Thank you Townsville City Council for your financial support through the Grants of Excellence in the Cultural Development, assisting with costs to travel to Brisbane and speak at the opening launch.

Glide an installation by Robert Crispe, Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester

Glide from Aaron Ashley on Vimeo.

Glide Artist Statement

Glide      

Robert Crispe, Michelle Hall, Jo Lankester
Mixed Media Installation, Dimensions Variable, 2014

Edmund Burke wrote; the sublime and the beautiful are not the same thing. An experience does not have to be pleasant in order for it to illicit an emotional response or to cause the viewer to feel something.

Combining shapes, smells and sounds of birds and aircrafts used in war, Glide is a project which aims to be aesthetically sublime.  Sublime in the way Burke thought of it; moving imagination, creating a sense of uncertainty, but still producing pleasure, while drawing to our attention the transfiguration of society as we react to the relentless trauma of war and endless natural catastrophe.
Robert Crispe’s video art provides a beautiful yet apocalyptic sky for the drone-birds to glide in.  Michelle Hall’s sculptures become the drone-birds flying in the chaos of the apocalypse.
 Jo Lankester’s prints create the rugged, worn texture of the gliders as they negotiate a terrain fraught with danger.
Glide is the second collaborative project between the three Townsville-based artists. The choice to work collaboratively pushes boundaries and comfort zones within their individual practices, diversifying techniques and processes when working on obscure sub-straights. Sharing the experience of creation and presentation, acts to shield the individual artist from the normal anxieties of a creative practice and in turn facilitates innovation.
Showing at Pinnacles Gallery, Townsville

Exhibition Dates: 7 February - 30 March 2014

Robert Crispe, Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester, Glide, Print Assemblage & Video Art, 2014

Glide by Robert Crispe, Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester - Artist Statement / Additional information

Glide

Robert Crispe, Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester
7 February - 30 March  2014, Pinnacles Gallery, Townsville

In our statement we talk about creating an experience where people can think about the trauma of war and natural catastrophe. In their paper 'The New Normal' published in Art Asia Pacific Masters, Lee & Zhang identify how in this decade words like 'crisis' have been used at a significantly higher rate in the media than ever before, crises has become normal.We have become numb to crises.  They go on to talk about how artists respond to the crises. Glide is our response, a response in the context of a garrison town surrounded by world heritage qualilty,  natural beauty. Glide is a combination of birds and planes, which illustrate the rich mixture of crises in our region. An army  making war and a dwindling number of bird species.  We draw on the sublime to attempt a feeling of vulnerability in the viewer to draw attention to how this situation of crises, is glossed over or ignored, but momentarily trapped in the gallery the viewer becomes confronted with an abstracted version of the everyday.  This is precisely the point of engaging the sublime. Just as Damien Hirst once did when he made 'The physical Impossibility of death in the mind of someone living.

Sound & Smell

The sound and smell is an important element to the installation taking the viewer on a sensory journey whilst walking amongst the installation and viewing the work. Melanie Pocock wrote sound and smells ’are intended to bombard visitors’ sensors, causing them to wonder about their intended effects.’

Flotilla: an Installion with Video Art by Robert Crisp, Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester

Flotilla
Robert Crisp, Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester 
Strand Ephemera 2013, 30 August - 8 September

Flotilla at Dawn

Our most recent collaboration was Flotilla for Strand Ephemera 2013, this time with a digital projection extending the collaborative process to include video artist Robert Crisp.

Flotilla explores notions of loss and anonymity experienced during chaotic times. Textile forms suggestive of ghosts have been printed with boat forms. The appearance of the work shifts with nightfall as an atmospheric projection acts as a storm on which the ghost boats float.

Strand Ephemera 2013 was located on the picturesque Townsville Strand, the event was held coincidentally at an incredibly windy time. In anticipation of the wind we intently installed our work to the lower hanging branches from only one anchor point so that the wind would not totally destroy our print assemblages.

Flotilla could be view over 24hrs with each significant part of the day contributing to the dramatics of the piece, and playing a very important role in conveying our interpretation of a long journey at sea. Dawn brought a sense of calm, a time to reflect an opportunity to assess the damage from the storm the night before. Midday was the transition time of the sails filling with wind and uncertainty of what was to come. Dusk brought strong wind, tension, and vulnerability. Night brought uncertainty and fear. The cycle was repeated each day with the installation taking on the physical effects of the elements.

Flotilla at Midday

Flotilla on Dusk

Flotilla at Night

We would like to thank Gallery Services and Townsville City Council for their support in going beyond normal expectations to accommodate our digital projection

Custom Frames by Brush & Press @ Artisans on Flinders, Townsville

At Brush & Press we specialise in making custom frames for prints and works on paper. As artists ourselves we understand your framing needs.

We use a blond Australian timber moulding, Quandong, and Plexiglass to make our frames, and pride ourselves on purchasing materials locally supporting Townsville small business.

Jo Lankester, Message to the Living, Linocut, Artisans on Flinders

Window Display of Prints and Greeting Cards at Artisans on Flinders

Wing Tip Vortice an Installation by Michlle Hall & Jo Lankester @ Cell Artspace Cairns

 Wing Tip Vortice: A Comedy of Events

Wing Tip Vortice by Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester was on display at Cell Artspace Cairns, from 3 August until 31 August 2013.

 

Wing Tip Vortice, Cell Artspace, Cairns

Michelle & I hit the road at 4.30 am Saturday 3 August for a 5 hour road trip to Cairns to install Wing Tip Vortice at Cell Art Space.  The previous day we organised with Pack & Send Townsville to make a traveling cardboard crate to transport the Wings to Cairns. The box was 2m L x 85cm W x 45cm H. Pack & Send provided strapping to go around the width of the box to keep the lid contained. Michelle and I were very proud of our traveling crate and commented how sexy our box looked.

Carefully packing the artworks made of etchings printed on vintage pattern paper, bamboo sticks and wall paper paste, into the box we then strapped the box to the roof of my car. This is where the calamity, now comedy, begins. On the drive home I kept saying to myself remember the box on the roof, remember the box on the roof, it soon became a mantra. I pulled into the driveway stopping before entering under the house as the car would not fit with the box strapped to the roof. 

I then received a text from one of my colleagues at Artisans on Flinders informing me of all the sales for that day, and being a Friday evening I knew I would have to restock the shop for the weekend as Sunday is one of our busiest days with the Cotters Markets. After a short stop at home I got back in the car at 6pm and started repeating the mantra ‘remember the box on the roof’, in hind sight I should have taken the box off and left it at home. I spent the next 3 hours restocking the shop and proceeded home remembering the box on the rook right up until I pass my house and pull into the driveway. There’s my son rushing to the gate to help me in, I spot a cigarette in his hand and loose my train of thought yelling what’s that in your hand, you know I don’t want to see you smoking’ I’m saying this as I pull in the drive way and crunch the sexy box into the raised garage door!

 

The damage looked like this

I quickly reverse the car and jump out hyperventilating. My world just imploded as I thought I had destroyed the artwork that was to be installed in Cairns the following day. Holden was great; he kept telling me to calm down and helped me take the box off the rook to inspect the damage. To my great relief and surprise the artwork was not damaged the box and artwork just lifted and changed shape. I cannot express my relief in words. Holden helped me mend the box and repack the work. He even got up at 4am to help strap the box back onto the car roof. Thank you, Holden.

I pick Michelle up from her house and begin our road trip to Cairns, I told her my horror story of the night before and she took it well, we had a little laugh but it was pure tension release on my behalf and relived that she took it well. 2 hrs down the road as the sun started to rise we were driving through Cardwell. We pulled over for a toilet break.  Along the way we had some light rain and at that point thought it would have been a good idea to wrap the box in plastic in case of rain. The rain wasn’t too heavy and we convinced ourselves that the box would be fine. When we go out of the car we saw that the lid of the box had lifted to where one of the straps was exposing the artwork to both wind and rain. You can image the disastrous thoughts running though my head. Mind you we pulled up in front of a tool box talk for the roadwork crew which was a bit intimidating to say the least. We took our box off the roof and inspected the damage. Once again there was no damage to the artwork. The wind had shifted the artworks to the back of the box compacting the wings to sit flat. There were quite a few bugs in there but no damage. FEW!

 

After repairs to the box in Cardwell

After re-strapping the box length ways to prevent the lid lifting again, we took off to Cairns and still in front of the road crew which meant no lengthy stops along the way.  We arrived ½ an hour before install at 10am.

 

No damage on arrival. FEW!

Michelle Hall & Jo Lankester

Wing Tip Vortice

Michelle Hall

We would like to thank Townsville City Council for supporting our project through the Grants for Excellence in Cultural Development in assisting us in making this exhibition possible, and to Cell Art Space for proving Michelle and I with the opportunity to grow our audience outside of Townsville.

We would also like to thank Sammy for demounting the exhibition and returning the not so sexy box to us in Townsville. X

About Place an Exhibition of Prints by Jo Lankester, Zelma Schulten & Rhonda Stevens

About Place an exhibition of prints and print sculptures by Jo Lankester, Zelma Schulten & Rhonda Stevens telling a visual story About Place, Townsville. The exhibition Opened at 12pm on Sunday 16th June 2013 as part of the Celebrate Townsville Festival.

Location: Brush & Press Studio @ Artisans on Flinders, 354 Flinders St, Townsville
10am-4.30pm Mon-Fri
9.30am-1.30pm Sat & Sun

Exhibition duration: 9 June until 14 July 2013

Jo Lankester 
Artist Statement

The Landscape has always been of interest in my work. I am inspired by the colours, textures, natural rock and land formations, insects, trees, and the esoteric nature of place.
I believe the landscape depicts its own story to be told. I draw inspiration in the solitude of drawing on location. The process I go through to create my pictures is that I start to see and draw the landscape in the distance and then gradually focus on subjects in closer proximity until I start to see and interpret the essential character of place.
These Monotype is reflective of winter in the dry tropics which I have interpreted to be the essential character of Queensland.

Jo Lankester, MT Stuart IV, Monotype, 2012, 76 x 56cm, $545 framed

Jo Lankester,  MT, Stuart Grass Trees II, 2012, Monotype, 76 x 56cm, $545 Framed

Zelma Schulten
Artist Statement

Life’s journey
“Mountains cannot be surmounted except by winding paths” J.W. Goethe (1749-1832)
I have used Townsville’s picturesque landscapes as symbols to portray my journey through life. Local paths, bridges, waterways and mountains represents voyages, crossings of tribulations, decision making, challenges, failures and triumphs.
Even though we share life and the landscape, you as the viewer, will have your own unique connection to some very familiar Townsville scenes. So too will we all experience life differently as individuals and will make our own unique decisions with different outcomes.
The landscape, similar to our life, is constantly changing: new seedlings will sprout, streams will redirect, harsh changes will be made by nature’s forces, roads will be closed, but still the journey will continue

Zelma Schulten, Kissing Point’s Path, Zink plate Etching, 20 x 25, 2012 cm, Edition 30, $295.00 framed

Zelma Schulten, Wooden Bridge over Creek, Zink plate Etching, 20 x 24,6 cm,2012, Edition 30, $295.00 framed

Zelma Schulten, Ross River from Riverside Gardens II, Copper plate Etching and Drypoint, 32 x 26 cm, 2012, $295.00 framed

Zelma Schulten, My Castle II, Zink plate Etching and Drypoint, 20 x 16,5 cm, 2012, $295.00 framed

Rhonda Stevens
Artist statement

Rhonda Stevens lives and works on Magnetic Island and her natural environment remains a constant source of inspiration with the myriad complexities of humanity, particularly the disparate interconnectedness of peoples and things
 After following her love of sculpture from studying at Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne she has moved into the magical multi leveled world of printmaking and seeks to explore both in the developing of her art.
Is place caught in the shadows, the reflections, the echoes, or is it “about place” where we are in time trammeled in the continuous flux of the mix of life?
The very nature of Place is its always shifting let us keep exploring everywhere with our natural sense of wonder not blinkered by the material world

Rhonda Stevens,Tickle, Etched Aluminium & Charbonnel Ink, 2013, 55 x 36 cm, $295.00

Rhonda Stevens, Auguries on the Sea Shore, Etched Aluminium & Charbonnel Ink, 2013, 55 x 36 cm, $295.00

Rhonda Stevens, Shadows on the Wall 1, Etched Aluminium & Charbonnel Ink, 2013, 55 x 36 cms, $295.00

Rhonda Stevens, Shadows on the Wall 2, Etched Aluminium & Charbonnel Ink, 2013, 55 x 36 cm, $295.00

To find out more about Celebrate Townsville Click Here

P.S. To purchase any of the prints and prints sculptures featured please contact me directly or come into Artisans on Flinders, 345 Flinders St, Townsville