Wednesday 24 November 2010

abstralian austraction

today i think about australia and abstraction
or rather, as the title goes: abstralian austraction.

there is aboriginal art, post-modernist landscape abstractionists, sydney mob who generate flashy neo-abstract expressionist replicas, urban bansky stencil warriors and the occasional nature inspired painter. But what about vegemite and bark and eucalyptus and stuff?

I am just trying to understand what abstract means in terms of our culture, history and identity. Or does it even matter? Not sure that I even have an argument.

Yet I feel there is something vital in a whole heap of artists work...something that pierces the veil of the post-modern, conceptual, machine driven art world and exists as itself, without trying to be....i don't even know who has it, but i see it and when i do, it goes bOOm. you know who you are.


As usual, my attempt at intelligence is GAMMON.
Think i might paint in vegemite.

5 comments:

  1. been done, darling....and there's a big problem
    cats just lick it straight off the page!

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  2. Call me old fashioned but I still reckon Ian Fairweather came the closest to nailing it in terms of culture, history and identity.

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  3. i agree...interesting though that he was english....like JOhn Wolseley.

    Did Fairweather use vegemite?? not sure...hmmm.

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  4. Not sure if Fairweather used vegemite..... but he certainly "used" a lot of red wine on Bribie Island. Ha !

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  5. good questions to ask Imbi... abstraction and this land!
    really like your drawings... and what you are working on!
    S

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