Shaun Gladwell

This was an article I had published on Concrete Playground.

Friday, March 26, saw Shaun Gladwell’s new exhibition Interior Linework/ Interceptor Intersection open at Campbelltown Arts Centre. Gladwell has become a ubiquitous presence in discussions of contemporary Australian art and may now also appear in conversations relating to that $64,000 question: ‘what is our national identity?’

After studying at COFA, Gladwell began exhibiting at significant local galleries such asArtspace and Sherman Galleries. In addition to paintings, Gladwell introduced skateboarding, BMX riding and hip hop dancing (activities not usually associated with the white cube) as subject matter in his works. Yet for all his interest in the fashionable and narcissistic forms of video and performance, and the inclusion of these ‘cool’ subcultures, Gladwell did not lose his interest in making objects as art. The miniature BMX bikes displayed in a vitrine at the most recent Sydney Biennale, were, for me, extremely aesthetic objects.

In addition to some new works, Interior Linework/ Interceptor Intersection consists of works from the MaddestMaximvs project, which was shown at the official Australian Pavilion at the 2009 Venice Biennale. MaddestMaximvs marks a paradigmatic shift for Gladwell and, most significantly, sees the artist engage with Australian cultural identity and explore dimensions of Australian masculinity. Max, the protagonist in George Miller’s trilogy, is an Australian icon. A composite drawn from our inherited cultural imagination, he is part lawman, part outlaw — reminiscent of bushrangers, explorers and even boundary riders. However, as Blair French notes, reverence of this character has led to audiences missing subtleties and particularities of identity and meaning, not to mention points of doubt, lack, failure and critical wounding.

For me, it is crucial that Gladwell strongly subverts the legacy attached to Max. From a formal starting point, Gladwell’s signature slow motion and fixed camera alert viewers to a different stylistic lexicon from the rapid cutting and euphoric visual adrenalin of Miller’s films. In a sense, this parallels Gladwell’s break from the shaky hand-held, constantly moving camera that characterised the skating videos Gladwell encountered and in turn critiqued. Concurrent with earlier works, Gladwell documents activity with no apparent pragmatic or productive output. Audiences are left to consider Gladwell’s explorations of time, place and our relation to the spaces of this country — whether a desert track near Broken Hill or a car park in Kings Cross.

For me, much of art’s attraction lies in its ability to polarise opinion. Instead of making the pilgrimage down to the Masterpieces show in Canberra, stay closer to metropolitan Sydney and visit Campbelltown’s impressive gallery space. This is a show that will drive you to either agree with John McDonald’s description of Gladwell’s oeuvre as banal, or to encounter a series of works that are incredibly relevant in terms of indigenous relations as they presently stand (in the mind of Nikos Papastergiadis), or agree with me that Gladwell’s work is utterly relevant in relation to our constant identity crisis. And, if nothing else, there are two rebuilt V8 Interceptors included in the show, and they’re rad.

Sequence Analysis from Two Hands

The bank robbery scene from 1hr, 16minutes.

This scene perfectly encapsulates the tone of the entirety of Gregor Jordan's film. There is a great narrative contained in this five minute sequence; there are moments of tension, moments of character exploration, and moments of humour. There is a death, but also an escape; two escapes really; and most intriguingly, the criminals get away with a bank robbery that we must believe goes un-solved.

The sequence opens with a wideshot of Jimmy approaching the camera. We are in the suburbs; there are dogs barking. This is a drasticly different setting than the last time we saw Jimmy, as he was escaping Pando's gang in the scrub, presumably near Little Bay or a similar deserted beach. We can see the effect the previous night has had on Jimmy, he is tired, his clothes are torn and dirty; we can almost smell his exhaustion.

The camera now cuts between midshots of Jimmy and then his two accomplices and their kids, and Jimmy's sister. "Well, look what the fuckin' cat dragged in, ey" illustrates that the two other robbers are not all that concerned, but the close-ups of Jimmy's sister shows her anxiety over Jimmy's safety. This is exactly the sort of trouble she didn't want Jimmy getting into, a fact we know is compounded by her feelings of familial responsibility since their brother passed away.

The story jumps forward; the characters are in the car on the way to the robbery. Jimmy is in the backseat getting dressed; in the front seats are the two other criminals, telling yarns over the monotony of the hand-held police radio. These two look calm, the are smoking and laughing, one almost forgets that they are about to undertake an armed robbery, and could instead mistake this for a trip to the pub on a Friday afternoon. The look on Jimmy's face hides nothing however. He is terrified, especially by the implications of the stories being told in the front seat. The differences between Jimmy and these two fellons are palpable; yes Jimmy has got himself mixed up in some less-than legal business, at his essence, he is a good person. These two, while they may be charming to Australian audiences, are not so admirable. Their language is crass, they are loud and obnoxious, and have obviously done all this before.

Their arrival at the bank is marked by a mid-shot of the security guard. The camera slowly pans out, accompanied by quiet but dramatic music. The pans out accelerates and there is a stylstic pan and zoom to the blue Commodore our protaganists are driving; this camera sequence is accentuated by a staccato note from a trumpet, or other horn instrument. We hear "alrighty then before the camera has made it to the car, so we know the robbery is about to happen. Then Jimmy asks "what if we see any cops?".

The camera cuts, and we are in the backseat with Jimmy; the camera pans to the leader, who sits in the passanger seat for his answer which boils down to a nonchalent "shoot 'em"; we see Heath's horrified reaction. As we will find out, this is a fairly timely question. The reality of the situation is inescapable and the tension is all the while built through the gradual crescendo in the music.

There is a cut and we see the car lunge forward from its stationary spot twenty or thirty metres before the bank. As the brakes screech, the music has hit it's most dramatic, and the two robbers, run from the car and pacify the security guard, who, as a close-up demonstrates, is caught by surprise and is essentially helpless. Jimmy and his accomplice drag the guard inside the bank and throw him on the floor and then turn, in sync with the camera's turn, to the customers queued up inside the bank. They looked surprised by not at that frightened, until Jimmy shoots out one of the security cameras (which parallels the story told to him on the car trip to the bank). As the customers drop to the ground, the camera cuts and is now located at Jimmy's head hight, just to their left hand side, and the two men turn to look just to the camera's right. The music, which had ceased for a few moments, as Jimmy shot the gun, now moves into a theme not unlike a piece of music from a Star Wars film. While Jimmy maintains control of the crowd, the other criminal leaps over the counter and forces the clerks to empty their registers, and then holds the manager at gunpoint to lead him out the back to the safe.

We cut back to Jimmy as one of the customers starts to get up. Jimmy yells out a warning, to no avail. He then strikes the man in the torso with the butt of his rifle. In a continuation of another story line, Jimmy pulls a $100 bill out of the man's shirt pocket, and the note has a doodle, which was drawn by one of Pando's gang earlier in the film.

We cut back to see Jimmy's accomplice attempt to jump back over the counter, only to trip and land on his head, knocking himself out. The audience cannot help but laugh. This is an effective break of the tension, and typical of Australian films, not letting themselves get too serious. One cannot help but think of how many other things could have gone wrong. The silence in the room and the movement of the camera parallels the uncertainty of Jimmy and the customers in the bank. For a moment, nobody knows what to do. Jimmy cautiously tries to gain the attention of his friend, but to no avail. the music has cut out, and all we hear is the shuffling of the customers as Jimmy starts to panic.

Despite the ridiculous situation he is in, Jimmy thinks clearly; he grabs the gun and the money off his mate, and tries to drag him to safety, but he is too heavy. He is again at a loss.

The camera cuts to outside of the bank, so we hear nothing and our view is obscured. We see Jimmy trying to get the attention of the getaway driver without bringing too much attention to himself. After a frustratingly long length of time, one that feels like an eternity for the viewer (we really worry about Jimmy by this point in the film), the driver acknowledges Jimmy, but doesn't understand what is happening. Jimmy has to run outside, as some customers start to get up.

The driver is in disbelief when Jimmy relates what has happened, and again, Jimmy acts the more experienced and yells to startle the driver into action. As they run back into the bank, Jimmy shoots out the other camera, and the viewer cannot help but think that the footage will end up on 'Funniest Home Video' or some other candid camera highlights reel on TV that night. The two fellons finally drag their friend out of the bank and into the car. As they do, we hear a gunshot. Jimmy, who leads the camera's gaze, looks back quickly. The camera moves to look out of the rear window, but as it does, the rear window is shattered by a bullet. The leader of the gang, who was knocked out, is awake and starts shooting blindly at the cops, hitting one in the shoulder. We see a close-up of a tyre as it is shot out; how will Jimmy escape now?

He climbs into the driver's seat and tries to drive but we see another tyre shot and the tyres now disintegrate as Jimmy tries to accelerate away. Once again we cannot help but laugh for a moment at the ridiculous situation the men are in. Non-digetic rock music begins as a gunfight ensues. The one cop left shooting runs out of bullets, which provokes Jimmy and his accomplice to regain their composure and coreograph a quick get away.

The camera cuts to be several metres in front of the car; we can't see the cops, just the two men jumping out of the getaway car, and that the driver has been shot and is lying face down on the asphalt; we must presume he is dead. There is a brief transcendence into slow-motion as Jimmy realises what has happened, but the sound of a bullet ricocheting disrupts this moment, and Jimmy starts running again.

The camera cuts, and we are now away from the bank robbery, but as we quickly find out, not all that far away. We see a businessman on his phone, he is literally twiddling his thumbs, oblivious to what has just gone on down the road, and what is about to happen to him. The camera cuts and we see the criminals approaching this man, we see his face as he realises what is happening. But the leader approaches a woman loading groceries into her car, but is stopped by Jimmy, who has seen the man with the sports car; the man jumps inside his car and locks it, and when Jimmy can't get in, he smashes through the window, again with the butt of his gun, and pulls the innocent bystander out of his car.

Jimmy and his accomplice get in and drive off.

Interview with Samuel Hodge

An interview I conducted with Samuel Hodge for Art Month.

In the forward to ‘Pretty Telling I Suppose’, Gert Jonkers wrote that, “Sam never really knows what he’s going to photograph”. I very rarely see you with a camera, how do you incorporate photography into your life?

I don’t know. Some days I’ll just pick it up and take it out.

Do you sometimes kick yourself because you don’t have it with you?

Oh you know, something will come around again. Sometimes I take it out because I think something will be a great opportunity, I get the roll back and it’s nothing. I don’t know. It’s even beyond me.

You say that the moment will come back again. But something I take from your work is that they depict moments that happen by chance.

Well most of the photos I take now are in my apartment. Or I might go to a birthday party and take my camera to take some photos. Just in a normal way. But maybe on the way to or from, something will happen. But most of the time it’s just me cooking, or being in my apartment. And that’s it. And occasionally a storm will happen. I don’t search for anything.

The fact that a lot of your photos are set inside is interesting. I see rather drastic stylistic differences between your landscape work and the work that takes place in more intimate setting. Do you have a preference?

I like light. I can’t take photos on a sunny day. It just doesn’t work. Also because my camera can’t handle it and it’s just awful. So cloudy days.

Will that stay the same?

I don’t think so. Things are changing. I had a lot of over-exposed images, flared, stuff like that. But I’ve been noticing a change in what I’ve been doing. I’m getting into photos of stuff like eggs. ha

My favourite works of yours are portraits. And a lot of those are your friends. Obviously you have developed a trust with those people. As you do more organized shoots, for instance the shoot you just did for Russh, how will you create that same intimate environment?

With that Russh shoot we made sure that the models we were getting were at least interesting. She was really funny. She was totally real. She just showed up in a biker’s jacket and Volcom jeans and was just amazing. You know, has no idea about fashion or anything. Now she is one of the new faces of Prada and Calvin Klein and she is working in Paris and New York. She had just finished high school the day before. I mean she loves bongs, and told me how, you know, well she came to my house first and we just sat there and talked, and she told me how to survive rabies if I caught it. Stuff like that.

So you had kind of developed…

Yeah within half an hour we got along really well. And then the other models came along, and a lot of the other people on that shoot, well we tried to even it out, I brought in real friends, and photographed portraits of them. We wanted everyone to just hang out and get along and that’s what happened. No one hated, I mean it was a really fun day.

To have your friends there, is that a bit of a safety net? Do you find it difficult without that?

Well yeah. I’ve done that before. I just did a job in Melbourne and it was a bit difficult because I wasn’t close to the talent.

Did you find yourself having to direct them around?

Well yeah. But that sort of thing is really rare. It’s kind of a separate thing altogether. With the fashion stuff I’m only really working with Russh, and I don’t think I’ll really do anything else. I’ve turned down tonnes of stuff. It’s getting a bit too easy to slip into that…

I read an interview with Wolfgang Tillmans and he spoke of a safety that some photographers have and how big a challenge it is for some photographers to go into a shoot without too much of a preconceived idea.

Well yeah. A lot of places will tell you an idea of what they want. And you just agree with what they say, and then you just go and do it, and then they’re happy with you what you give them. It’s never going to turn out…especially with the way I shoot, because I don’t even know what I’m doing.

How sentimental are you? Do your photographs act as a sort of time capsule for you?

Um, yeah I’m quite sentimental. But maybe more nostalgic. Oh god what’s the difference between nostalgia and sentimental?

I think there is often a sort of melancholy associated with nostalgia.

Yeah I get that with the photos sometimes. Yeah I get quite nostalgic with them. I’m told I get a little too nostalgic about some. I’ve never really been embarrassed about them. Wait, what is sentimental again?

I think the sense that you like to hold onto things.

Oh yeah, no I don’t think I’m very sentimental. I mean with what I’m doing now, I’m destroying the negatives. I mean I hate having that stuff around.

Can you speak a little about your relationship with Rainoff? How did you meet those guys?

Rob had somehow stolen a picture of mine from the internet, well borrowed, and used it on his website. And he knew a mutual friend and he said, “Oh that’s Sam’s photo” and he gave Rob my details. So Rob emailed and asked me if he could used it and I said “yeah, sure”. I was overseas at that time. Then I went in and gave Rob a copy of my poster-zine and we just started hanging out. Then Sinisa just emailed me one day and said “do you want do a book?” and I was like “Ok”. And that was it. And then we just hung out more and more and more. And now I know you through them.

The title, ‘Pretty Telling I Suppose’; I know it’s a title of one of the photos but is there an irony there. Your photographs seem to invite very subjective readings.

The title is real because the image is a hand being waved in my face and it’s…well I’d spent a Christmas with my ex-boyfriend and I went to take a photo of him and he was like “don’t take my photo” and waved his hand up in my face and I was still stringing along this relationship and so it was quite a literal meaning of the image for me. I mean, that pretty much sums up everything and that’s it.

Have you had any problems? I mean I know there were potentially problems with publishing photos of ex’s?

No. I think that’s fine.

You have a show at MOP coming up. How did that come about?

Ron and George at MOP, they really like my stuff and they just wanted me to have a show there and they wanted to put me on during Art Month. They’re really great guys and I can relate to them because when I first met them I wasn’t really involved in the art scene at all and I’d had one little group show at Chalkhorse a few years before. They said they really liked the work and I was saying “Well I don’t really know how to get involved in the arts” and then they were like “it’s ok”. Because you know, I was saying how I didn’t go to art school and that I dropped out of high school, and they were in the same position and totally gave me the confidence to go forward and do stuff. And they’ve asked me to do this show, purely, I mean they like my work and I’m honoured.

Alex Lawler

An article I had published on the Art Month blog.

Alex Lawler’s artist talk at Flinders Street Gallery on Saturday March13th was the first time I had seen this new work and only had time for quick walk through before Alex was introduced by the gallery’s owner. I was able to deduce however that Lawler was well versed in Modernist movements of the last 60 years.

For emerging artists, talking about their work can be a double-edged sword; it gives the artist a chance to extract from their work ideas that are most important to you, and also a chance to gauge from the audience which works or ideas interest them. However, the emerging artist is also very vulnerable; perhaps their oeuvre is not all that extensive and they have not really found themselves as artists yet and scrutinising questions can easily find them wanting. Also interesting about this scenario is the fact that viewers could encounter the artist before the work, whereas before the emergence of these artist talks, their personality was absent, removed from the experience of their work. However there is a lot to like about Alex Lawler. He’s young, charismatic, and well read. He has European breeding, an affecting but not overwhelming sense of confidence, and the ability to succinctly communicate quite complicated ideas with seeming ease.

Three or four major themes are situated in his work. The carpet paintings speak to a Post-Minimalist tendency, which strove to incorporate the reductionist underpinings of Minimalism, but to explore more fully elements of materiality. For the Post-Minimalists,carpet would have provided a tactile response from the “body ego”,perhaps as Lawler suggested, the sensation of walking barefoot on carpet. Particle board provides another departure point in terms of materiality. These works, which explore High art and design colour theories, are displayed at a twisted angle, a reference to Mondrian and Malevich; and Lawler aptly posits, why wouldn’t or shouldn’t a painting look as good at that angle? One of the major works in the exhibition (coincidentally it was purchased by Art Bank), is -Minimalist exploration. Sixteen squares are positioned in a square, but are all slightly askew. This softening of the strict geometry of seminal artists like Carl Andre complements the tonal qualities of the individual compartments.

An intriguing element of this show was the paintings of cigarette packets. The soft, crumpled form that one associates with a pack ofMarlboro Lights has been flattened onto the canvas, and the design aesthetic spotlighted. These could be design mock-ups for anything,airline logos, playing cards, cardboard juice containers, yet there is something that makes them recognizable as cigarette packets.

Perhaps the most furtive ground treaded by Lawler in this show is his inclusion of utilitarianism as a fundamental concept in the work. His vodka bar is based on seriality and reminds me of Donald Judd, yet once again the choice of materials differentiates Lawler’s piece. As I walked into the gallery I was surprised to see a take away coffee container sitting on the polystyrene cinder blocks, and even some brochures. But was reassured when it became clear that these were Lawler’s possessions, and he was indeed subconsciously stressing the functionality of this work. The utopian ideals of Modernist designers perhaps coming to fruition, and just up the road on Flinders St.

My major criticism of Lawler’s show is a lack of focus, but perhaps that should not be discouraged in a young artist. He alluded to thefact that he worked on all of these works simultaneously over a six month period, whereas perhaps he should have focused on fewer ideas and considered them for longer.

His short and sharp speech, to a disappointingly small, but appreciative crowd, covered all the bases. He discussed the title and premise of the exhibition, chronicled his Samstag Award and plans to study in London; he spoke of the discourse between speculative and functionalist thought taking place in his work. He surmised effectively his raison d’etre, that the questions that arise during the production of his work are the reason that he wants to produce art.

Comparitive Analysis - Does Ray Charles Shine?

Australian film makers beat the bio-pic fad by almost a decade with Scott Hick's Shine (1996). So how does this film rate against the mega blockbuster Ray (Taylor Hackford, 2004). Both films focus on characters who struggle against formidable odds. Ray Charles, obviously was blind, but also fought heroin and alcohol addictions. David Helfgott, suffers a mental breakdown as a young man and is later diagnosed as having schizoaffective disorder. Both are talented pianists but encounter trials and tribulations throughout their lives. David in particular, is fighting not only his illness, but memories of his stubborn, selfish, abusive father. Charles, on the other hand, is aided by memories of his insistent mother who inspires him to remain independent despite his handicap.

Interestingly, Ray Charles, as we all know, went onto become one of the most significant recording artists of the 20th century, while David Helfgott, while he still tours worldwide, probably would have lived out his days quietly with his wife, having flown under the radar of most Australians. I believe this point is significant. Australians love(d) this film even though they had probably never heard of Helfgott. He is the un-sung hero, a character who didn't get too successful (I'm referring here to the all too common 'tall poppy' syndrome), a construction that Australians love to identify with. They leave the cinema feeling great, they have seen Helfgott suffer with adversity and triumph, but not too much. (Of course, Scott Hicks, can only create a film in accordance with Helfgott's life, he couldn't fictionalise him becoming one of the world's most recognisable stars; what I'm suggesting is that Helfgott's story resonates because that outcome didn't eventuate).

Anyway. just some thoughts.