ART meets ACTIVISM

The Clifton Hill tunnel painter or 3068TP, is Clifton Hill’s answer to Banksy. They started during the pandemic to brighten up the lives of the local kids. They have continued to relentlessly repair and develop what was once a grim environment.

Angela Brennan is a Melbourne based painter working predominantly with lively colour and abstraction, depicting elements of an inner world. Her evolving practice consists of humming, floating forms and surfaces—a process which allows for dreamt imaginings to spill out and thrive. Imagery and colour are arranged intuitively in her work, and often immersive in scale. Her paintings transport the viewer warmly and invitingly into her universe; a state of introspection, contemplation and feeling.

Angela Brennan has exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Australia and internationally. In recent years her work has been included in the major curated exhibitions Shut Up and Paint at the National Gallery of Victoria, and the National Gallery of Australia’s touring exhibition Abstraction: Celebrating Australian Women Abstract Artists and she presented a solo study in the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art’s major 2016 exhibition Painting. More Painting. She completed a PhD at MADA, Monash University in 2019, a BA from the University of Melbourne (1992), and a BA, Fine Arts, Painting, RMIT University (1981).

She has been awarded numerous overseas residencies, most recently in Rome and in Cyprus. Her work is widely represented in major public and private collections in Australia and overseas.

Angus McDonald is an award-winning artist and documentary filmmaker.

After graduating with an Economics degree at the University of Sydney, McDonald studied painting at the Julian Ashton Art School in Sydney, winning the school’s Brett Whiteley Scholarship in 1994. He continued his studies at the Florence Academy of Art in Italy in 1999 & 2000.

Since 1995, he’s staged more than 30 solo exhibitions across Australia & internationally. In 2007 he travelled to Antarctica as the expedition artist for the Mawson’s Huts Foundation and returned there in 2009.

www.angusmcdonald.com.au

Anna Farago is an artist and educator living on Wurundjeri Country in Naarm/Melbourne. Her father, Peter, is a longterm member of RAC.

Frequently collaborating with fellow artists and local communities, Farago’s investigations are animated by feminist art histories, craft traditions, the intergenerational transmission of knowledge and experience of place. Farago embraces a fluid and performative approach to making that incorporates craft, works on paper, painting and photography. Farago is interested in the formal language of textile design and it’s orientation to colour, geometric shape and line. Her work utilises femmage, a way of making with a centuries long history in which the artist incorporates scraps and leftovers and combines materials in collage. Central to her practice is an exploration of ecosystems. Her work poses questions around ways in which we sustain material traditions, the intersection of personal and collective memory, and processes of constructing and reconstructing belonging.

Since attending Art School in the mid 70s I have generally made narrative works in a number of Art Forms – including painting, printmaking and sculpture – and over these years, I have returned quite often to making work which relates to political, or politicised subjects.

I think that I do this because it is the only way that I can voice my dissent about wrong decisions and inhumane behaviour.

I started doing this whilst still at Art School – painting at that time about the community dismay when the Whitlam Labor government fell.

Sadly, the subject and subject matter surrounding the refugee crisis has not diminished – and I hope that this event will in some small way assist the admirable people who work so closely and directly to support refugees.

I have a continuous interest in painting the built environment, how we shape it and how it shapes our lives and through this our relationship to place, home, community and shared spaces. And the subject then becomes the starting point for the possibilities of paint. For around thirty years I have been painting the buildings, shops and streets of everyday Melbourne, attracted by their colours and shapes , their cultural significance and particular character. In a rapidly changing urban environment the painting become a record of a time – recent histories.

I have been included in many group shows and have held ten solo exhibitions, with the most recent being at  FOUR EIGHT FOUR, in Carlton North. Images of my paintings can be found at www.484presents.com.

Creator of many of Melbourne’s most loved public sculptures – such as “Angel” at Birrarung Marr and “Ophelia” at Southgate – Halpern’s works exude an innate vitality and alluring simplicity. Spontaneous in form, her creatures are painted in a style that recalls visions of Gaudi, Picasso and the playful surrealism of French sculptor Niki de Saint Phalle, yet all have become distinctly Halpernesque in their ability to delight and surprise. Halpern’s work is whimsical, colourful and fun, using glass or ceramic tiles over concrete or fibreglass; powder-coated laser-cut steel; as stand alone works or as an installation to be explored.

Eric Henshall is a Melbourne-based artist who has been exhibiting since 2001.  He has exhibited in Australia, North America and Europe and his work is represented in private collections across the globe.

Eric studied Fine Art at RMIT and he has had studios in Melbourne, Venice, Paris and Mississippi.

Born Brisbane 1987. Georg Whelan works through figurative painting, film photography, drawing and text to observe daily rituals and constructed narratives, referencing a spectrum of sources from historical figures to bathroom graffiti. Georg studied fine arts at QUT and has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in Australia and internationally since 2006.

Helen Bowman is a Melbourne-based maker and jeweller. A graduate of RMIT Gold and Silversmithing, Helen works in both traditional and non-traditional materials including base metals such as galvanised iron. Her work has been exhibited in a number of regional galleries.

Hoda Afshar explores the nature and possibilities of documentary image-making. Working across photography and moving-image, the artist considers the representation of gender, marginality, and displacement. In her artworks, Afshar employs processes that disrupt traditional image-making practices, play with the presentation of imagery, or merge aspects of conceptual, staged and documentary photography. Recent exhibitions include; Speak the Wind, Monash Gallery of Art (2022), Aichi Triennial, Japan (2022), When the Wind Blows, KUNST HAUS WIEN MUSEUM, Vienna (2022), WE CHANGE THE WORLD, National Gallery of Victoria (2021), Between the Sun and the Moon: Lahore Biennale (2020), Beyond Place Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego CA, USA (2019) and Primavera 2018, Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. In 2015, she received the National Photographic Portrait Prize, National Portrait Gallery, in 2018 won Bowness Photography Prize, Monash Gallery of Art, Australia and in 2021 she received the Sidney Myer Creative Fellowship for outstanding talent and exceptional courage. Hoda is represented by Milani Gallery in Australia.

I studied design at RMIT in the late 1950’s, then worked as a packaging and toy designer for many years before doing fine art at Phillip Institute in Melbourne, graduating with a degree in 1984. I was awarded the Walkers Award, a prize for graduating students Australia wide. My work was exhibited at the Meat Market where I had studio space as part of the prize. Exhibitions followed, my work was acquired by the Craft Council of Victoria. I later did some study at the New York Studio School of Drawing and Painting. I am currently working towards a solo exhibition of paintings at Alexandra Sasse Gallery for March 2023.

Jennifer Joseph’s poetically titled, uncompromisingly abstract paintings, works on paper, assemblages and sculptures have a distinctively transformative quality. Collage, an important aspect of Joseph’s practice, is employed to highlight the intrinsic qualities of those materials selected. New life is breathed into the discarded, overlooked, found objects that she incorporates into much of her minimalist work.

Joseph’s artistic process is inextricably linked with her life; her nocturnal existence circumventing the inevitable interruptions one is faced with during the daylight hours. This allows Joseph to sit for long, contemplative periods, considering a work before she physically executes it. She balances intuition with finely honed skill, developed over nearly forty years of dedicated studio practice, so that when the time comes, she is deeply focused, completing her work at great speed, with fervour.

Her career can be described as a continual paring back, her current work characterised by refinement and restraint, featuring only the most essential marks.

Born in Melbourne in 1949, Jennifer Joseph received a Diploma of Arts and Crafts from Melbourne Teachers College in 1971 and has been exhibiting since 1986. She studied fine arts part-time at RMIT from 1977 to 1979. Despite her years of study, Joseph considers herself essentially self-taught. She realised early on that her development was to be found through a dedicated studio practice. Jennifer Joseph currently lives and works in Melbourne.

The still life, the self-portrait and the realisation of specific spaces have been enduring concerns throughout Kevin Lincoln’s career. His sensitive consideration of these subjects has emphasised modesty, restraint and natural beauty, concepts that are echoed in his collection of Japanese pottery. Items from this collection have appeared frequently in his work in recent years.

In 2015 The Art Gallery of Ballarat held the highly regarded survey exhibition Kevin Lincoln: The Eye’s Mind. The exhibition featured a diverse range of work from over 25 years of the critically acclaimed artist’s career and then travelled to Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, Launceston in 2016. A comprehensive exhibition catalogue accompanied the exhibition and the major monograph, Kevin Lincoln: Art and Life, written by Hendrik Kolenberg, was published in 2006, providing great insight into the artist’s extensive oeuvre.

Kevin Lincoln currently lives and works in Melbourne.

Photograph credit: Ben Cox

Information coming soon.

Margaret is a practicing artist represented by James Makin Gallery in Collingwood. In 2009 she completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the Victorian College of the Arts, followed by a Masters of Art Therapy at Latrobe University in 2016. She currently works at Arts Project Australia, a studio and gallery that supports the representation of neurodiverse artists within the contemporary art environment. 

Megan Evans is a multidisciplinary artist, working in video, photography, sculpture, and installation. Megan’s work is informed by social issues, examining the nature of belonging and the impact of colonisation on identity, both self and nation. Megan began her creative life doing large political murals in the 1980’s during which time she met and later married Indigenous artist and activist the late Les Griggs which informed her perspective on colonisation.

Current work looks at how colonisation shapes the identity of the coloniser and approaches the task of decolonisation through dismantling the aesthetic of the colonial era. Megan positions herself as the colonial body in the contemporary Australian landscape and examines how to take responsibility for a past she has inherited. Her work is both aesthetically seductive and confronting at the same time.

Recent exhibitions include: Keloid #9, Annandale Galleries, Sydney – UNstable, Horsham Regional Art Gallery – Footscray Art Prize winner – Return, BOXOprojects California USA – The Observance of Objects, Ballarat FOTO Bienale – PARLOUR, Art Gallery of Ballarat – SQUATTERS AND SAVAGES, Art Gallery of Ballarat, Benalla Art Gallery and Blakdot Gallery – UNreconciled, As a part of TREATMENT at Melbourne Water Western Treatment Plant, Werribee Australia, UNsettling at Trocadero Art Space, Melbourne.

www.meganevansartist.com

I am a South African-born Australian artist. I moved to Australia in 1978, living and working in Canberra and Sydney before settling in Melbourne (Naarm) in 1990. I worked in universities for many years taking part in union and political struggles. I have been an advocate for refugee rights and freedom for a long time and I remain a staunch supporter of RAC.

I have always painted but in 2014, I completed a Master degree in Contemporary Art at the Victorian College of the Arts. I have worked in many forms of art and photography, and have exhibited constantly since then.

I believe there should be no borders but until then we must work to make our government, whatever their persuasion, to not only free refugees, but to give them the support they need to live fulfilled lives.

Mostafa (Moz) Azimitabar is a Kurdish musician, artist, writer and Human Rights activist.

Based in Sydney, Moz recently made his mark in the Australian art scene with a stunning self-portrait which made the finals in the Archibald Prize 2022, currently on tour around Australia.

Moz is dedicated to countering oppression and human rights abuses with a message of love.

Naser Moradi is a self-taught artist. He is a Hazara man from Afghanistan who has been in Immigration Detention in Australia for more than 7 years. In his work, Naser conveys his wish that all people be treated with compassion. While his body of work expresses his own lived experience of detention, it also strongly speaks to the need for all human beings to be valued and respected. He states, “We are human, just like you. We also wish to know freedom.”  While in detention, Naser has created more than 200 artworks which have been exhibited several times across the country. He has an extraordinary talent and a unique ability to express hope where hope is difficult to find. The sale of his painting will allow Naser to access painting materials and continue his passion. Naser is still in detention today.

Neil Taylor is best known for his intricate sculptures that explore the essence of form, utilising, as he notes, “the laws of structure (to) reveal space as pure potential”. Taylor creates patterns of geometric shapes comprised of wire soldered together, or manipulated with pliers, rhythmically repeated to form complex three-dimensional objects.

Working in both intimate and monumental scales, Taylor’s sculptures begin as meticulous sketches, later progressing to work that sits atop plinths, tables, suspended from wall or ceiling, or, as with his larger-scaled works, freestanding both indoors and out. In addition to wire, Taylor works with welded steel, papier-mâche and found objects, and has previously worked with animation.

Neil Taylor has been exhibiting regularly in Australia and overseas for over forty years and is the recipient of a number of sculpture prizes. He has completed a number of major commissions including sculptures for Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne and Melbourne Art Fair. Neil Taylor currently lives and works in Melbourne.

Sangeeta Sandrasegar has consistently engaged with shadow as a formal and symbolic motif in her exploration of postcolonial and hybridity theory. Best known for her delicate paper cut-outs, Sandrasegar’s practice includes watercolour, drawing, sculpture, video, embroidery and printmaking. Drawing from her own upbringing in Australia and Malaysia, and her Indian and Malaysian ancestry, Sandrasegar explores the relationship between migrant communities and homelands, giving voice to the identities of people caught on the margins of society.

In 2004 Sangeeta Sandrasegar completed a Doctorate of Philosophy at the Victorian College of the Arts and the Australian Centre at the University of Melbourne. Her work is currently showing in the exhibition Charkha and Kargha at Powerhouse Museum, Sydney. She has exhibited throughout Australia, her work has been featured in numerous public exhibition including at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; the Australian Centre of Contemporary Art, Melbourne; and the Gallery of Modern Art, Queensland; in addition to major international exhibitions and biennials in New Zealand, Korea, India and the USA.

Sangeeta Sandrasegar lives and works in Melbourne.

Photograph credit: Jaimi Joy

Shane Kent trained as a potter in Japan and Australia before completing a Bachelor of Fine Art (Ceramics), post-graduate studies in sculpture and education, and a Masters in Drawing. He taught the Diploma of Art (Ceramics) at Box Hill TAFE from 1989-2011.  He has exhibited in Melbourne since 1985, most recently at Australian Galleries.  He has undertaken major ceramic commissions through design studio Projects of Imagination for custom tableware, lighting, bespoke tiles and artwork.  Shane is founder/director of the School of Clay & Art (SoCA) in Brunswick.

Steve is an established ‘process’ painter who merges traditional philosophies with experimental media and re-presents them through painting processes. Gaining a PhD (exploring the pain-altered mind-body connection); Masters of Fine Art (MFA) by Research; and BFA with Honours, combined with training in sport, pain recovery and experience with Zen have led to over 30 individual exhibitions and numerous group-shows over twenty-five years.

Consequently, his work can be found in public and private collections throughout Asia, Europe, the USA, New Zealand and Australia.
Although his work is ongoing through a range of parameters, they are often grouped into series. By re-presenting a niche idea into the language of paint he effectively creates a contemporary take on ancient traditions, often merging the digital and the analogue worlds, re-presented into the world of material making.  Disparate research is conflated from Zen-warrior martial arts; neurological mind-mapping and psychological brain-training methods, which combine with a great interest in conscious and unconscious processing. These become key elements re-presented as a painting methodology that reinvigorate the weighted, historical concerns of calligraphy.

Like coloured Rorschach tests, these works open the experience of viewing and interpreting for the viewer’s own associations. The aim is to involve your unconscious emotive responses without thinking about it consciously.  Look, feel and enjoy.

Steven Rendall’s work is littered with references to technology, art history, horror movies and pop music. Materials, images and meanings are scavenged and rearranged in various ways.

Rendall was born in the UK in 1969. He moved to Melbourne in 2000 where he currently lives and works. Steven Rendall is a lecturer in the School of Art at RMIT University. He completed a Bachelor of Visual Art (Honours) at DeMontfort University in Leicester, undertook post-graduate studies at the Royal Academy Schools in London and completed a PhD at Monash University in 2015.

Rendall has staged numerous exhibitions in Australia and the UK. His work is in various collections including The National Gallery of Victoria, The Monash University Collection, Artbank, RMIT University Art Collection, The City of Melbourne, St. Vincent’s Hospital, Melbourne and St. Helier Hospital, London.

Artist, author and broadcaster Tai Snaith lives on unceded Wurundjeri land on the Merri Creek. Her work celebrates the intersection of stories, collections, people and place. How objects like books and vessels can illustrate the times we live in as well as the past. 

How like literature, objects can convey a deep emotional point of view. Tai has artwork held in public collections such as the NGA works on paper, Artbank and the city of Banyule and the State Library of Victoria. Tai has recently created large commissioned works for Metro, SLV and the Great Victorian Rail Trail.

www.taisnaith.com
www.instagram.com/taisnaith

Dr. Tony Hanning is an internationally recognised glass artist whose work is represented in all major collections in Australia and many overseas collections including the V&A Museum in London and the Tacoma Art Museum in the USA.

He is the author of ‘Nick Mount: The Fabric of Work’ published by Wakefield Press (Adelaide 2012)