Cameo Creams and Other Confections

Judith G. Klausner, 'Oreo Cameo #9', oreo sandwich cookie, 2011

Can’t afford an expensive cameo?  Take a leaf out of American artist Judith G. Klausner‘s book and make your own, out of….Oreos.  When she’s not fiddling with creamy centres, Klausner likes to crotchet bits of toast, crucify bees and make wallpaper designs out of ketchup and other sauces (below).

Judith G. Klausner, 'Condiment Wallpaper #1', 2011

But for confection-based wallpaper you can’t go past Brisbane artist Elizabeth Willing, who arranges sweets into elaborate William Morris-style configurations, photographs them, then posts them up on walls – a durable, fragrance-free alternative to Klausner’s mustard, jam and barbeque sauce concoctions…

Elizabeth Willing, 'Lodden', 2009

Looking Forward – Kohei Yoshiyuki

Kohei Yoshiyuki, 'Untitled', from the series 'The Park', 1973

Kohei Yoshiyuki, The Park, opens at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, on July 2^nd.

On the bonnet

Ngipi Ward, 'Nissan', 2007

Whilst looking at indigenous artist Ngipi Ward’s painted car bonnet at GOMA, Leg of Lamb couldn’t help but think of Rohan Wealleans.  There is a curious kinship in the artists’ layering and excising of paint, that reveals the accumulation of colours beneath.  Rohan’s had a go at painting a bonnet too, earlier this year he created A thick cream (below) for a Kidz First charity raffle in Auckland.

Rohan Wealleans, 'A thick cream', 2011

Some recent work by Linda Marrinon

'Defeated Serf', 2010

'Woman with Shoulderbag on Base with Jerusalem Stone', 2011

'Voltaire', 2010

'Woman with Poncho', 2011

The works above are included in Linda Marrinon, Figure Sculpture 2011 at Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney, until July 9th

The Moral Meaning of Wilderness

Juan Davila, 'After Image, A Man Renounces Love', oil on canvas, 200 x 280 cm, 2010

Last weekend Leg of Lamb caught the final day of ‘The Moral Meaning of Wilderness’, an exhibition of recent large-scale works by Juan Davila at the Griffith University Art Gallery in Brisbane.  Shifting between figuration and abstraction, Davila revisits the techniques of plein air painting, depicting the Australian landscape in quickly executed pastel colours. Works like After Image, A Man Renounces Love (above) contain swirling, organic forms that recall the automatism of Gorky, amongst others, fused with a pop-like candy-coloured sensibility.  In contrast, paintings like Arthur Street (below) are intentionally anticlimactic, despite their heroic scale.  Here, Davila paints the land with soft, feathery strokes that disintegrate into absolute nothingness.  By subverting the conventions of landscape painting, Davila problematises traditional notions of the sublime. Instead, his work examines our current state of ecological crisis and Australia’s complex relationship with the land.

Juan Davila, 'Albert Street', oil on canvas, 85 x 235 cm, 2007

The Moral Meaning of Wilderness will travel to MUMA in Melbourne later this year.

Hot Photo Friday – Greta Anderson

Greta Anderson, 'Jamie' from the series 'The Stand-Ins'

Instant sculpture

A little DIY Christo outside a furniture shop in Fortitude Valley.

Channel 4 report on Ai Weiwei

Ai Weiwei Released on Bail

Ai Weiwei greets reporters from his studio in Beijing

Chinese artist Ai Weiwei was granted bail last night.  The 52 year old has been in police custody for over two and a half months charged with ‘economic crimes’. According to police officials, he was released ‘because of his good attitude in confessing his crimes’ and because of chronic illness.  (Ai suffers from high blood pressure and diabetes).

The news comes on the eve of a major European trip by Chinese premier Wen Jiabao during which leaders were expected to press the case for the artist’s release. Speaking from his studio in North Beijing, the noticeably thinner artist (who cannot leave the city without police permission) stated; “I’m back with my family. I’m very happy” but, due to his bail conditions, made no further comment about his detainment.

Several of Ai’s friends and colleagues are still missing.

Neon in the kitchen

Adam Hollingworth and Sophia Kouyoumdjian, 'Fata vian invenient #2', 2005/2011 (part one)

Adam Hollingworth and Sophia Kouyoumdjian, 'Fata vian invenient #2', 2005/2011 (part 2)

Included in MOP’s recent exhibition When Good Curators Go Bad (curated by Michael Dagostino) were two metallic prints by Adam Hollingworth and Sophia Kouyoumdjian.  The works, entitled Fata vian invenient #2 convey banal kitchen scenes enlivened by the unexpected inclusion of neon.  Reminiscent of the work of Bill Culbert in their fusion of formalism and the everyday, the works are quietly amusing.  They wryly acknowledge neon’s rich history as a high art material and, through the strategic insertion of plastic drink bottles, pineapples, and other domestic objects, conflate the division between art and life.