Griffith University Art Gallery
Hollow Mark | Madeleine Kelly
Finished work, I head across the bridge to the Griffith University Art Gallery. Tonight is the exhibition launch of Hollow Mark by Madeleine Kelly.
A quick look at the gallery’s website prior to my visit informs me that Kelly has become increasingly recognised for quasi-narrative paintings which draw on personal and mythological sources. Her investigation of contemporary issues via painting uses metaphor and allusion to explore, among other things, the relationship between the individual self and consumer culture, sustainability and gaps in knowledge. [1]
At the end of the long sloped walkway of the gallery entrance I pick up a glass of wine and continue on to take in the first few works just inside the door. They are small earthy coloured painted canvases; this oil painted colour scheme carries through many of the works. The images of idealized animal, ghostly human and humanistic animal figures inhabit unnatural painterly environments. Curiously, faces are never approached in much detail and are in some cases non-existent. People jostle for position; eager to view the fine details of these beautifully polished works.
Across from the entrance, a large vivid yellow/green canvas punctuates the high white walls of the significant rectangular space that forms the main part of the gallery. The far end seems darker and there is a timber installation–a freestanding archway of sorts that people are filling through. I want to go straight there to have a look but a large work hanging from the ceiling first commands my attention. Two panels of fiberglass resin three metres long sway in the breeze of the people walking past and behind them. A bright light behind illuminates all the oil colours of the sensitively painted figures. The legs of these elongated figures seem wooden and their heads are missing. I imagine a reference to deforestation.
Briony Law
[1] Exhibition Program, Griffith University website - http://www.griffith.edu.au/visual-creative-arts/griffith-artworks/queensland-college-art-gallery/exhibition-program
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