February 7 – March 15, 2020
Exhibition Opening Saturday February 8 at 2pm
Guest Opening Speaker David Kerr, Artist and Designer
Sculptures and Images
Ian Hamilton - John Hayward - Rebecca Lloyd - Karl Meyer - Deborah Sleeman - Clancy Warner - Elizabeth Close
Artists selected from the Heysen Sculpture Biennial are exhibiting their works in Hahndorf Academy’s galleries and gardens.
IAN HAMILTON Since 1978, Ian was awarded an Arts SA grant to “study the art of the golden bowerbird” and he has continued to make work based on that initial research while becoming increasingly concerned for the fate of these remarkable creatures due to climate change.
“Blackened bird-figures, high on poles, surround a lone bird-figure trapped in a cage-like structure. From high on their poles the bird-like figures look down on their trapped fellow.”
JOHN HAYWARD The Dividing Line: This series of paintings and drawings are somewhat of a departure from my usual sculptural and assemblage work, although there are some sculptural elements in the show. These paintings explore the simple graphic of the curved line which, with some rendering, become transitional fractures in an unknown and confusing space. In some instances the line represents a rift in an uncertain surface and in others becomes an impending atmospheric apparition. In all cases the attempt has been to render a spatial illusion that emerges from a painterly two dimensional surface.
REBECCA LLOYD lives and works in the Adelaide Hills. She trained as a blacksmith in Hereford, UK and uses predominantly traditional techniques. She is passionate about bringing the ancient techniques of forging metal into the contemporary world.
Previously her work has been largely functional, and is only recently delving into the world of sculpture.
KARL MEYER is an Australian based artist/designer with a track-record in creating and developing artworks and sculptures over the past decade. A fascination with the evolution of ideas and how they influence people and the physical environment led Meyer to study Industrial Design in the early 1990’s.
He has blended his art practice with his proficiency as an industrial designer since 1993 and has a reputation for bringing originality and fascination to his approaches, always encouraging engagement and a sense of curiosity to the work.
DEBORAH SLEEMAN is a sculptor based on Kangaroo Island. Her work is largely inspired by the natural world and island community of people plants and animals within which she lives and works.
Her work is informed by formal study and research as well as life experiences of a landscape traversed slowly, sailing and walking. She has exhibited widely in SA, Vic and NSW.
This sculpture is inspired by rock formations found the world over; places used for millennia as shelter by people, plants and animals. It is dwelling as a state of being, not on the earth but of it, from it, within it. These formations are the places of found cubbies and imagination, the places of sacred rock art and of shelter in a storm. They dwell inside us, in our collective memory. They embody the continuum of time.
CLANCY WARNER was born in Orange, N.S.W., in Wirarjuri country, and grew up on the Hawkesbury River, Kuringgai country, an hour north of Sydney and has travelled extensively.
“My art practice strongly reflects my view of the world; I see art like I see life: it is interconnected; everything is related, everything has an energy. It’s how the artist molds the energy that turns the bronze or the piece of wood into an artwork that you can feel, one that has movement, one that has life. I use sustainable materials as much as possible, often working with re-claimed wood, discarded steel and re-claimed bronze. Using sustainable and re-claimed materials helps reduce the impact on the environment and supports my personal ethic of reflecting the interconnectedness of all things.”
ELIZABETH CLOSE is a Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara woman and a Contemporary Aboriginal Artist based in Adelaide. Her dynamic multi-disciplinary visual arts practice explores both her own, personal connection to country, and the concept of Aboriginal connection to place and space more broadly.
