The Timbre of Texture

The group of women artists selected are impeccable makers. Adept at working across varied mediums, their practices are multifarious in both their materials and in their ability to articulate wide ranging concepts simultaneously. The selection of artworks showcases varied textures and artists whose attention to detail and hand-making allows them to explore the very nature of materiality. The neutral palette of white and black allows surface above colour and form to come into the focus.

The materiality in all of these works exists within intriguing dualities: Sarah Contos’ theatrical sculpture created from repurposed cane furniture shaped into the symmetry of a butterfly, hard rattan wings softened by the puff of the textile covering; Jacqueline Fraser’s refined silhouettes twisted in hard black wire, delineating a female profile are both veiled and adorned with richly detailed fabric covering; the sumptuous fake fur of Kathy Temin’s sculpture is minimal in colour and form yet voluptuous in materiality; the alluring illusion of a fleshed out potted plant, soft canvas that is in fact hardened by poured hydrostone in Caroline Rothwell’s experiments with hybridity; the opulence of Rothwell’s Baroque cartouches animated from the humble materials of carbon emission drawings on glass; the meditative rhythm of Yunupingu’s earth pigment painting on unconventional mediums such as discarded photographic paper provide fascinating textural contrasts.

Made by the hand, these intricately detailed artworks entwine richly layered meanings within their elaborately textured surfaces.