Bulletin. June Bennett: Silver Swirl Powdercoated Steel 47 x 26 x 27cm

Transcription

1 The SculptorsSociety Bulletin Use your smart phone to scan this QR code and visit our website January/February 2015 June Bennett: Silver Swirl Powdercoated Steel 47 x 26 x 27cm

2 EXHIBITIONS FOR 2015 Gateway Building March 1 Macquarie Place, Circular Quay, Sydney The Incinerator Art Space April-May 2 Small Street, Willoughby AMP Angel Place June 123 Pitt Street, Sydney AMP Centre June 50 Bridge Street, Sydney MEMBERSHIP FEES ARE DUE FOR RENEWAL Our membership fees for 2015 are due December 1st 2014 Full member $80, able to apply for entry into any of our exhibitions. Student member $60, able to apply to some exhibitions. Associate member $45, for non sculptors but with all other membership privileges. Young member $30, for those under 25 and with the same rights as student members. Membership form will be on website Or call Feyona for a form. Website option B, whereby you can have up to 16 images displayed, instead of the 3 we automatically give you, is now overdue. Please renew promptly, for $100, or your images will be removed. Reinstatement takes time and energy, and there may be a delay in effecting that. Darling Park August 201 Sussex Street, Sydney Australia Square Tower September 264 George Street, Sydney MLC Centre October Castlereagh & King Streets, Sydney The Concourse October 409 Victoria Avenue, Chatswood Contact Details: Maryann Nicholls (02) Eva Chant Feyona van Stom sculpt1@bigpond.net.au ; web: GALLERY SCHOOL SCULPTURE CASTING SERVICES AND SUPPLIES CLIVE CALDER MOB: TEL: australianbronze@bigpond.com Web: 19 North Fort Road, North Head Reserve Manly NSW 2095 DO YOU NEED A MOULD OR CAST OF YOUR SCULPTURE MADE? FRIENDLY / AFFORDABLE / PROFESSIONAL Contact for a free quote CLAIRETENNANT.COM.AU PH: Working with Silicones, plaster, fiberglass, resins, cold cast alloys and synthetic stones. 2 2

3 MOULD MAKING WORKSHOP with CLAIRE TENNANT Here is an opportunity for 5 people to do a mould making workshop using the Painted Mould technique, where layers of silicone are built up to form a thick skin, and then a plaster backing mould created over the top. This technique is particularly suited to the organic nature of sculpture and is perfect for various types of casting including lost wax, resin, cold cast alloys and gypsum based products. This workshop, would run for 3 days. The location is Marrickville, 2204 It could take place over a weekend and one week day/evening. Cost is $400 per person plus material costs. All materials and safety gear will be provided. If you would like to learn how to make a mould for your own sculpture then please contact our member Claire Tennant on to make arrangements. claireetennant@gmail.com From the FROM THE PRESIDENT President 2015 has come in with some interesting new exhibitions to participate in. An has gone out to you through Eva with someone looking for an underwater sculpture for Bowen, Qld. The Harbour sculpture exhibition (in Woolwich) is another opportunity Eva has sent out to everyone. Keep your eyes open for interesting opportunities. Our own Gateway exhibition will have started when this bulletin gets to you. Go in and enjoy the setting. Maryann has sent the callout for images and ideas for our next exhibition at the Incinerator. This is our chance to exhibit outside work, ideas that you have had that cannot be displayed in our CBD venues, multiple pieces, and large or small works, wall pieces, installations and ceiling and even underfoot pieces. Please submit ideas and images as soon as possible. All of Australia was shocked at the terrible end to the siege in Martin place, and the death of two of the hostages. Katrina - the daughter of our member Jane Dawson, was an amazing person and to have her life cut short is a tragedy to all her knew her, and especially her family. We are sorry. Eva, Feisal and myself (and husband) as well as several members who worked with May Barrie at her studio, and helped her to keep working until the last year, were at her amazing memorial day at Albion Park, her home for many years with her husband and family. It was wonderful to see her work in its natural setting. June Bennett has written a piece about her for our members. Our Christmas party was a big success and we enjoyed the new menu - however we have had a suggestion from Angela on our committee, that we could do the catering ourselves. This will be a new challenge for us. I also would like to bring back the numbers we used to have when the cost of the dinner was lower, so to that end we are suggesting a BYO and we would provide one bottle of wine per table. Of course there will still be food expenses and venue expenses, but we hope to get the costs right down and have a larger attendance. Put the date in your calendar December 3. Anyone who has an amazing and easy recipe they are willing to share - please put it forward. Another challenge for your committee and sculptors is that AMP at Angel Place would like a 3 venue exhibition and we are in discussion as to how that would work - we will need entries submitted at callout. Start thinking about the works you will submit - and of course you will need at least 3 plinths if you enter each venue. The AGM is coming up on March 12th at the Mosman art gallery venue. We will provide snacks and drinks as usual and we have a lot to get through in the evening, including voting for your committee. Afterwards several committee members will present amazing sculptures they have seen in galleries overseas and we are hoping for a good turnout of course from you. Support your committee and vote. Forms on website but call me (Feyona) if you d like me to mail one to you. Keep checking our website - buyers do, and visitors from all over do. Eva spends a lot o time keeping it all up to date and running smoothly. Michel Brouet has again agreed to take photos of sculptures at his studio in Leichardt for a very reasonable price - Gary has the information. Gary is also interested if you have any specific ideas that interest you for forums - we have had visits to bronze casters and watched a dramatic night pour. We ve had studio visits as well as presentations by members at the forum. Let us know what you would like to see. I would love to have a selection of your best works on file for advertising - send in photo / with title, materials and size. Looking at another busy year for If there is a red dot on your address label you are not up to date with your membership, we do rely on funds to keep the Society going, and the main account is this - our bulletin Feyona van Stom 3 3

4 Celebration of May Barrie s Life JUNE BENNETT, 7 Feb, 2015 It is my very sad duty and also a privilege to inform members of the Sculptors Society of the loss of May Barrie, aged 96. She was a member for fifty-six years, since 1958, and she was also a life member. She was an extraordinary woman, and we wish to recognise the amazing contribution that she brought to so many of our lives as well as to the medium of sculpture. May was born in Western Australia in 1918, and studied sculpture at the National Art School at East Sydney Technical College under William Dobell and Lyndon Dadswell. She completed her studies between 1938 and Her first exhibition was held in South Africa at the University of Pretoria in May led a very productive sculpting life working exclusively in stone and spanning a working life of 70 years. She spent her life carving stone as though it were soft clay. She had an inner compulsion, believing in the truth of material and freeing the locked form within the stone. Without electricity until the late 1960 s, she fashioned her works using a mallet and chisel and polished her work by hand, working on a smaller scale until the acquisition of power tools. Barrie s sculptures are characteristic of the Modernists showing a loyalty to the material and a focus on form. May was quoted as saying she felt that people were slow getting into the value of sculpture. In 1996 Wollongong City Gallery gave May Barrie a fifty-year retrospective exhibition of that was held both at the Gallery and at her home, as many of the pieces were too large to take to the gallery. May has worked on all types of stone from sandstone to marble but granite was her greatest love. She used to say it is a notoriously unyielding stone, one that requires hours, days and weeks to caress into shape, but would polish to a high shine. In 2009 May gained public recognition when she won Sculpture By The Sea, a $ prize with a (3mx2mx1m) grey piece of Granite weighing four tonnes from Moruya. Titled Time and Tide Monolith II, May began this work in 1995 and completed it the next year at the age of 77. It is now sited permanently under the giant fig in the Botanic Gardens, on the way down to Mrs Macquarie s Chair. Her last working day happened to be on her 95th birthday. Jan Shaw and I were working next to her that day. It is such a privilege to look back on that day. May was my mentor and friend. Our friendship began when I saw an article in Woman s Day in 1965 fifty years ago. The article featured May Barrie and her very modern contemporary Sandstone Sculpture. My real luck began when I learned that we to lived in the same town Albion Park. I was lucky to meet her within a week of seeing that article, and was invited to her studio that very day. May could see my enthusiasm and handed me a chisel and mallet. May showed me how to use those tools to clean off a weathered piece of sandstone. After bruised knuckles and much time, I found beautiful colours hiding under the weathering. I was then hooked on stone sculpture. In 1995, May encouraged me to apply to The University of Wollongong to do a Creative Arts Degree, after which, a few years later I succeeded in It opened me up to using many other materials in my sculpture - Foundry, Welding, Ceramics, Textiles as well as Stone. I owe my whole art life to May and her family. The family had a private scattering of May s ashes in the garden. There will be a public Memorial at the Callemondah Studios on Saturday the 7th February 2015 from Midday. For further information please contact May s daughter Tori De Mestre on

5 Some of May Barrie's sculptures in the garden 5

6 In this, our first issue of 2015, we report with sadness that the devastating death of 2 of Sydney s fine citizens during the Lindt cafe siege on December 16th 2014, struck us very close to home. Martin Place, in the heart of Sydney s C.B.D., is close to the stamping ground of many of the Society s favourite exhibiting spaces. And many of us had occasion to frequent the targeted café. The city will never feel the same again; there is a loss of innocence in our city now, as a result of this tragedy. But of most importance is that Katrina Dawson, who was struck down by ricocheting police bullets, was the beloved daughter of our member Jane Dawson, and her husband Sandy. Jane is a long-established sculptor who has been a Tragedy close to home Sally Zylberberg member of the Sculptors Society for many years, and she is known to a great many of our members. Jane travelled to Carrera Italy as a group of 5 sculptors including Alan Somerville and our Committee member Maryann Nicholls, tootling about in a Fiat having great fun, and producing some fine sculpture. Her works, which are often figurative, and often of lithely limbed animals, as panthers and horses made in bronze, are familiar to many sculptors and members of the public alike. At Katrina s memorial service, tribute was paid to her wicked sense of humour - well, we know where that came from! The outpouring of grief and love, as witnessed by the endless laying of flowers in Martin Place is also a testimony to the fine and indomitable spirit of the residents of this fine city. We join with them in mourning the tragedy that has occurred, in sending our heartfelt condolences to Jane and Sandy and their family and friends, and in being determined to stand firm in the face and defiance of evil. MEMBERS' NEWS NEWS FROM VIKKI Holik-Blazley Member, Vikki Holic-Blazley, was recently commissioned by the Fairmont Resort in Leura, to create another of her timber/steel Equine sculptures that they have named "Stix"! It is on permanent display in the foyer of the resort hotel based in the Blue Mountains. 6

7 MEMBERS NEWS MEIKE DAVIS Gallery Visit: On my last visit to Germany I had the good fortune to be taken to a very interesting sculpture garden situated behind a semirural Railway Station near Osnabrueck, a Town in Northern Germany. The artist" Volker Johannes Trieb" built his Studio and Restaurant in this location with the sculpture garden as the main focal point. The artist used the different garden spaces for his sculptures and ideas, ranging from ceramic pods hanging from trees, to rusted steel pieces lying in a ditch apparently discarded, only to be taken over by nature, to oak planks wedged between trees, to serve as tables. More thick oak beams and planks are arranged into a rustic dining setting morphing into the surrounding foliage. Rustic oak beams and planks as dining setting. The big rusty steel sound shells placed on a water feature were particularly impressive, standing inside the shells your voice reverberated back to you, making you feel strangely isolated in amongst the green space surrounding you. A very organic, slightly medieval and sometimes Alice in Wonderland feeling and impression was my experience walking through this magical sculpture garden. More can be learned at IMAGES SUPPLIED by Meike Davis: Titles invented by Meike Davis. The big rusty sound shells. Ceramic pods hanging from trees. Rusty steel pieces taken over by nature. 7

8 MEMBERS' NEWS GRAHAM RADCLIFFE I have completed a mural called Love is a Puzzle. It is 2.5 metres high x 2 metres wide. Made up of 20 Spanish limestone pieces 50 x 50 cms x 8 cm thick. I have landscaped an area of my block with views out to Moreton Bay, and we are going to try to have weddings and concerts there. user VIVIENNE LOWE Vivienne Lowe is exhibiting her bronze sculpture, Rhythm of the Heart, at the Blue Hotel, Woolloomooloo, as part of the 'Sculpture on the Wharf' exhibition. This show features a collection of significant sculptural work from Australasian artists, highlighted in one of Sydney s most iconic buildings. The exhibition continues until end of February, VALE: MICHAEL BEYDOUN BIRTH ANNOUNCEMENT Congratulations to Claudine Tucker, our Bulletin designer on the birth of her third child, a daughter Jasmine Jade born on the 21st November Long time member Michael Beydoun passed away in November, He exhibited often at our venues in Sydney. Michael enjoyed working with metal and could bend and shape iron and steel into beautiful sculptures, which were each unique and popular. Michael is survived by his wife Bushra and he will be sadly missed by many of his friends and admirers. 8

9 MEMBERS' NEWS Zhang Huan Sydney Buddha Angela Morrell Carriageworks Zhang Huan is considered one of the most influential contemporary artists of today and has work in many major collections throughout the world. Zhang Huan's first public performance was called Angel, which he staged on the front steps of the National Art Museum of China. Angel was critical of the Chinese government's controversial one child policy and it resulted in the entire exhibition being closed by the museum s director. In 1994, Huan covered his naked body in fish oil and honey and sat in a public toilet in Beijing. Flies gathered and crawled over his wet, putrid body. Huan considered that he wasn t doing anything shocking. He said, this was how most people in the city were made to live. The installation work was made to draw attention to the state of public sanitation in Beijing and the image of the peaceful, fly blown artist became iconic. In 1998, in New York Zhang Huan was included in Inside Out: New Chinese Art organized by the Asia Society. It was then that he decided to relocate, working in New York for 8 years. In 2006 he returned to live in Shanghai. Up until then his art had been largely installation and performance work. Huan has now a more traditional object-based practice. He employs 100 assistants to help him in the production of his prolific and often monumental work. Huan says We work in the same way as a factory but with a creative difference; we are making a unique piece. The whole studio follows one concept, directed by me and carried out by each assistant. On entering into the bold, raw and industrial setting of the Carriageworks space, where Sydney Buddha is situated, I was immediately affected by the enormity and impactful contrasting beauty of the sculpture. The artwork exists in two parts. One is a graceful 5 metre high Buddha that is a gleaming aluminium mould. Its head is decapitated and lies on the floor. The other half is deceptive, moulded from 20 tonnes of burnt incense ash collected from Buddhist temples in Shanghai, and the Jiangsu and Zhejiang Provinces of China. The strong smell I anticipated to come from the work is no longer there. Dozens of burnt out incense sticks that had been lit on the opening night of the exhibition protrude from the work. A steel structure holds supplementary moulds of a hand and face that function as extra support for those body parts that may easily crumble; they give an additional dimension. The ash embodies not only the prayers but supposedly contains the subtle odour of millions of teeming people and of human optimism. Now, the work is slowly disintegrating, and falls to the floor to be walked on and spread out on to the streets of the city of Sydney for the duration of the Carriageworks exhibition. The Sydney Buddha represents the collective souls, memories and prayers of the faithful. Huan's Sydney Buddha also extends his optimism towards how he feels between our differing cultures. I hope that the Buddha can bring hope and happiness to this city and its people. CONGRATULATIONS Morgan Shimeld Morgan was a finalist in the 2014 Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize, with his entry Triplex 9

10 JAMES TURRELL EXHIBITION Sally Aplin This exhibition is a retrospective of the American artist James Turrell's career of 50 years of working with light. Extraordinary light installations immerse visitors in spaces without edges or boundaries. This work has no objects, no images and no focus. Blue projections reminded me of Anish Kapoor's deep, bottomless spaces. In the work Ganzfeld visitors enter a space wearing protective foot coverings. There is a sense of singularity, of being alone and a sensation like walking on clouds in slowly dissolving pastel colours. In Perceptual Cell where a special ticket is required, individual visitors enter the pod-like cell lie on their backs. Once within, they experience a light cycle for 15 minutes, described by Turrell as 'behind the eyes' seeing. Vision is everything in Turrell's work. WWith nothing to focus on in quiet galleries with few other visitors (extremely limited entry) the imagination is free. There are many absorbing works, projections, holograms, drawings, prints and photographs exploring light and perception. Toward the end of the exhibition James Turrell is shown on a film speaking from his extraordinary studio, Roden Crater in the Arizona desert. I really enjoyed After Green, a work that reminded me of Mark Rothko. Whereas Rothko's surfaces are essentially matt and flat Turrell's work is three dimensional and boundless. I was pleased to discover The National Gallery of Australia has purchased this wall installation. A work to complement Within Without, a Turrell installation within a huge earth mound in the Australia Garden, on the south side of the Gallery For a contemplative, enriching experience I recommend purchasing a ticket for this absorbing exhibition which continues in Canberra until 8th June, Latham Australia Pty Ltd 14 Tennyson Rd, Gladesville, NSW 2111 Ph: 1300 LATHAM (528426) Web: sales@latham-australia.com For over 30 years Latham s have been supplying the stone industry, amateur and professional Stone Masons, Sculptors, and Marble and Granite users. We continue to support the Sculptors Society with the annual David Latham Memorial Award for Outstanding Work in Stone. Our range includes Cuturi Pneumatic Hammers, hand and machine Tungsten Carbide Chisels, nylon mallets, bitch picks, diamond blades, grinding wheels and disks. Sealers, polishers, waxes, cleaners, mastic and epoxy also in stock. Either drop into our showroom or contact us today for assistance. 10

11 welcome to our new members: Jian-wen ZHOU Full Member Georgia MORGAN Student Member Other SculptURE Societies: Victoria: Queensland: ATTRIBUTION of IMAGES All images in this bulletin were provided courtesy of the artists unless stated otherwise. Our members are reminded that the website is there for their benefit and helps to promote their work and personal information. All new information from artists can be included onto their webpages but we need this feedback regularly. As well, our website fees require annual renewal and the form is found on our website under Forms. Fees are now overdue and prompt payment would be greatly appreciated. BULLETIN ARCHIVES Archived copies of the Bulletin are available on Wour website: Find the link in the 'Services' menu. SHARE YOUR NEWS WITH US 2015 Calendar March 1 to 29 March 12 Gateway Exhibition CBD AGM and Forum April 14 to 4 May Incinerator Exhibition, Willoughby (Aquina Tierra 2015) May 14 June July August September 17 September October November December 3 Forum at Mosman art Gallery 3 venues exhibition with Angel Place and AMP 3 venues exhibition Darling Park exhibition (TBC) Forum at Mosman Art Gallery Australia Square (TBC) The Concourse (TBC) and MLC (TBC) Visit to studios (TBC) Christmas Party at the Mosman Art Gallery Grand Ballroom Classifieds Gargoyle Masonry Lic C Carving stone sales Marble and sandstone Pneumatics sales and advice Myles mylesraine@mac.com Stay connected Please like our Facebook page in order to be kept up to date with the latest Sculptors Society News & Events! sculptorssociety If you have some interesting news to share with our members, please Eva Chant with your articles/news and high resolution images. info@sculptorssociety.com If you have information ( and images) of your exhibition please send to Feyona and she can include on our facebook site. feyonavanstom@gmail.com The Sculptors Society Bulletins provide information, and topical news and views considered to be of interest to our readers. Nothing written here is intended as a substitute for professional advice, and no liability arising from our publications is accepted. Articles and reviews submitted may be edited at the discretion of the editor, and no correspondence in this regard will be entered into. All material (images, graphics and writing) appearing in this publication is subject to copyright interests claimed by The Sculptors Society and should not be copied or transmitted to electronic memory or otherwise without the previous written consent of the said Society. Copyright The Sculptors Society This publication was printed by Forestville Printing Sydney President Feyona van Stom Ph: feyona@vanstom.com 49 Rangers Ave, Mosman 2088 Vice President Maryann Nicholls Ph: nichom@bigpond.net.au Honorary Treasurer Feisal Ramadan Ph: Kooringal Ave, Thornleigh, 2120 Honorary Secretary & Website Co-Ordinator Eva Chant Ph: Mobile: Corang Rd, Westleigh, 2120 info@sculptorssociety.com Forum Director Gary Grant: gdsgrant@optusnet.com.au Bulletin Editor and catering organiser Sally Zylberberg Ph: , Fax: sallyjoyzylberberg@gmail.com Bulletin Designer Claudine Tucker Ph: editor@sculptorssociety.com Exhibitions Reviewer Angela Morrell Ph: Committee Members Jolanta Janavicius Ph: Lee Blattmann lee.blattmann@gmail.com Meike Davis Vrej Matossian matoss@bigpond.com ISSN

12 12 Philippa Graham: Stop...Now! Timber 65x65x20cm