site specific
WALL WORK
FACTORY 49 49 Shepherd St Marrickville Sydney 2015
BUNKERED
BRANCH GALLERY
Forest Lodge
GLEBE SYDNEY
6 - 27 SEPTEMBER
2014
CURATOR: Sarah Nolan
BUNKERED :
Installations by fourteen artists and architects exhibited throughout a Forest Lodge terrace. Curated by Sarah Nolan, director of Branch Gallery, Bunkered explored future living possibilities, issues and interpretations of climate change. The artists who exhibited at Bunkered were: Aaron Anderson, Lisa Andrew, Sarah Breen Lovett, Kuba Dorabialski, Kath Fries Yvette Hamilton, Anna Horne, Rachael McCallum, Sarah Nolan, Office Feuerman, Katy B Plummer, Madeleine Preston, Marlene Sarroff, and Lotte Schwerdtfeger. Video stills from video by Michael Filocamo commissioned by Sarah Nolan.
For the artists in BUNKERED the whole house is again “the canvas” but true to today’s zeitgeist the mood is uncertain, precarious, unpredictable, problematic. We are no longer so sure…of anything. The house is not only the real-life home of Sarah and her partner Gavin, it is also the site of Branch 3D, the window gallery that Sarah curates from the front room. This project expands the window gallery to include the whole house, which has now become an immersive experience where visitors can roam freely throughout.
“BEFORE I CLIMB THE NARROW WOODEN STAIRS TO THE NEXT LEVEL I ADMIRE MARLENE SARROFF’S TEMPERATURE RISING. THIS DELIGHTFUL AND CLEVER PIECE OF ABSTRACTION ACTS AS A MATERIAL, BODILY THERMOMETER. THE LOWER TREADS ARE PAINTED BRIGHT GREEN, AND AS YOU STEP UPSTAIRS THE COLOUR CHANGES TO A BLISTERING RED. AS THE SAYING GOES, “HEAT RISES.” IN THIS WORK YOU SEE AND TREAD THE CHANGE IN TEMPERATURE AS YOUR BODY MOVES UP THE STEPS.” VIA ARI REVIEW
MARLENE SARROFF / ARTIST STATEMENT :Temperature Rising
Climate change is the single biggest environmental and humanitarian crisis of our time. The Earth’s atmosphere is overloaded with heat-trapping carbon dioxide, which threatens large-scale disruptions in climate with disastrous consequences. We must act now to spur the adoption of cleaner energy sources at home and abroad.
In Bunkered, the house stairs and steps are used as a climate thermometer. As the visitors climb the stairs they can sense the temperature becoming warmer by the variations of the colour red on each step riser. As one transcends further into the attic, the red intensifies indicating heat rising as a metaphor for the planet warming. As the temperatures rise our buildings require careful planning to ensure less energy is used to heat and cool them.
On descending the stairs the visitor will step on green treads, a gradual gradient becomes dense in colour as you descend the stairs to the ground floor, indicating the environment is in good shape and provides a healthy environment. Once back on the ground foor the visitors are provided with an opportunityto participate in a questionnaire testing their knowledge on environmental issues.
DRIFT.
FLANERIE IN CONTEMPORARY ART
497 Parramatta Road Leichhardt. Sydney 28 FEBRUARY – 23 MAY 2013
CURATED by :
Judith Duquemin
Anke Stäcker
ARTISTS: MILEIN COSMAN (UK), JUDITH DUQUEMIN (AUS), PER FORMO (NOR),
MARLENE SARROFF (AUS), ANKE STÄCKER (GER). VAGNER M. WHITEHEAD (USA)
THE PURPOSE OF THIS EXHIBITION IS TO HIGHLIGHT ASPECTS OF FLÂNERIE THAT RELATE TO ACTS OF CREATIVITY IN CONTEMPORARY VISUAL ART BECAUSE THE ARTIST AS FLÂNEUR/ FLÂNEUSE IS AN INTRIGUING AND COMPLEX INDIVIDUAL IN A GLOBAL SOCIETY. EXAMPLES OF THEIR IDENTITY ARE REVEALED IN THIS EXHIBITION OF PHOTO-MEDIA, PAINTING, PRINT-MEDIA, DIGITAL ART, MULTI-CHANNEL VIDEO, AND SCULPTURE AND INSTALLATION, BY SIX ESTABLISHED ARTISTS FROM NORWAY, UK, USA, AND AUSTRALIA. (EXCERPT DR JUDITH DUQUEMIN ESSAY LINK ABOVE)
MARLENE SARROFF : THE ORDINARY BECOMES THE EXTRAORDINARY IN MARLENE SARROFF’S RANDOM ACCUMULATIONS 1&2. FOUND READY-MADES AND DISCARDED MATERIALS FROM INDUSTRIAL SITES SUCH AS BANNERS, ROPE, SPONGE, BOXING AND MESH, COLOURED CORDS, STRAPPING, SYNTHETIC FOAM, PLASTIC, ELASTIC, A VINYL CUSHION…FORM COMBINATIONS OF MATERIALS OF DIFFERENT DIMENSION, TEXTURE, COLOUR AND USE, TO BECOME TWO FREESTANDING STACKS OF CAREFULLY WRAPPED TABLETS POSITIONED ON PORTABLE, MOVEABLE TROLLEYS. EACH STACK APPEARING SIMILAR THOUGH MADE DIFFERENT DEPENDING ON THE APPEARANCE, HISTORY, INTERPRETATION AND RANDOMNESS OF THE ITEMS ACQUIRED. MARLENE’S THIRD WORK IS A SET OF COLOURFUL PLASTIC STRIPS SLOUCHED OVER AN OVERSIZED NAIL ON THE SECOND FLOOR.
in relation to …. Articulate Project Space 497 Parramatta Road Leichhardt Sydney 6 - 19 September 2013
CURATORS
BARBARA HALNAN ROSE ANN MCGREEVY
misquoting Einstein but retaining the sense:
‘the perfect end in a process should be as
simple as possible but no simpler’
In relation to . . . assumes a subject and in this case the subject explores notions of space, planes and the values between. Some of the work references the gallery space and some does not. Some of the work alludes to imaginative space whilst some to metaphysical space. Other work references what we cannot see. What is apparent in all the work is a constant engagement with the practice and practise of art to understand our world a little better.
The curators of this show are interested in pulling together artists with whom they feel a kind of artistic kinship, and hope this will create an overall gestalt which will allow the work to sit together, despite the very varied approaches of the participants. The aim is to create an event which has resonance coupled with engagement of the senses. It is said that art cannot be pragmatic but perhaps, instead, it only needs to be necessary.
WALL WORK
Factory 49 49 Shepherd Street Marrickville SYDNEY AUGUST 2011
CARRIAGE-WORKS
Wrapping Up
245 Wilson Street Redfern 16- 24 January 2009
Celebrating Carriage- works as a much appreciated re-imagined heritage space. Materials, bubblewrap, tape
The inaugural CarriageARTworks Contemporary Art Exhibition The Heritage -listed Eveleigh Railway and Carriage Workshops site is now occupied by Carriageworks. The rail yards contain the history of Australia's major rail network.Train carriages for Sydney's expanding rail network were built and maintained within the building and included the Royal Carriages constructed specifically for the Governor General of Australia and visiting Royalty, the first electric carriage, and the first air-conditioned train in Australia. The site was closed in 1988 Officially opening in 2007 as a contemporary multi Arts Centre.
Carriagworks redfern Sydney