“The Republic of Bees”
The gallery I chose to report on was the Milani gallery in Woolloongabba. The exhibition on at the time was Lucy Griggs “The republic of Bees” which was actually quite interesting, particularly the choice of material the works were presented on.
Majority of the exhibition excluding 4 works, consisted of small sized watercolour paintings on soviet school books. The combination of the book cover and the watercolour in my opinion went perfectly together to create a fresh an interesting take on watercolour. When I think of watercolour usually I think of older style images of nature or a vague image that doesn’t focus on the detail but more the colour and feel. Lucy Griggs watercolour paintings really appealed to me because of detail that has been put into each individual image; though small and neat they still have an impact visually and conceptually.
The subject matter of many of the pieces were detailed figurative images of people all in way I think tied together with an urban soviet feel. Images ranging form soviet border control offices to babies to old ladies were just a few of the 50 or so separate pieces that were on show. Other works were of almost opposite style, using sharp geometrical shapes and lines to create pattering or symbolisms. The other few pieces were of similar style but done on found piano sheet music, which still linked in with the feel and style of the exhibition as a whole.
The last piece I viewed was the sort of unexpected installation upstairs. Compared to the small watercolours this was of much larger scale, with full sized silhouette figures and geometric shapes painted on the walls with a series of balloons arranged in the middle of the room. I’m not the biggest fan of many installations and this wasn’t really any different to me. I would have much rather just the full sized figures and shapes on there own, the balloons didn’t really give much impact except novelty.
In conclusion Lucy Griggs exhibition “The Republic of Bees” was a great exhibition that consisted of over 50 small pieces and one larger that come together to portray what I think is a urban soviet theme by the artist.
Steele Evans.
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