Settlement 2016

Using online real-estate search engines I was immediately attracted to the central role that photography played and what is unintentionally revealed in these documents of properties for sale across Australia.

Settlement is not about kitchen countertops, bathrooms sinks and lounge rooms professionally staged for wide angled perspectives with mood lighting and a fresh coat of paint. Settlement represents the ordinary, the elderly, the low income and the regional whose life-styles are now being re-packaged for investment consumption.

Settlement In Relief 2020

Settlement in Relief digital ink jet prints push the barrier affect further applying a visual illusion of embossing where textures and surfaces of the collected images of domestic interiors recede and advance to create a duplicate image that forensically elicits sensations of touch.

Recognisable shadows, highlights, edges and digital artifacts in the greyscale images document the materiality of the spaces in which we live.

Hot Flush 2020

Hot Flush a set of cast bronze plaques of a carved relief profile of Queen Elizabeth II familiar to us all on commonwealth coins; show me the money.

The Invisible Hand 2014

I have an app on my tablet called World Live Cams Pro where the user can view live streams from security cameras located around the world. One of my favourite cameras to visit is located in a Russian village called Beloozerski.

The camera is mounted on the side of a tall residential building that houses the local Artist Union - organisations that were established during the Soviet era and still operating today, with 180 degree views over a suburb of high rise apartment housing situated in a semi-rural area 80 kms from Moscow. The app allows the user to control the high definition camera; pan left and right, up, down as well as zoom controls. I like the location because it is high density residential an every day local environment rather than typical CCTV spots in commercial or tourist districts.  

Prior to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1990 housing in Russia was fully state owned and while rents were very low, apartment sizes were very small and based on an allocated sqm per person, also people didn't have any choice about where they lived. Since the 1990s all Russian's have been given the title of their rental properties for free. Following this process of individual privatisation, the private construction/ housing/ mortgage market has taken hold. Over the short period I was recording my visits to Beloozerski many new high rise buildings have been built.

My movement and control of the cameras singular heavenly view found another socio-economic reference in the term ‘the invisible hand’ conceived of by political economist Adam Smith in 1759,  to describe his theory of the self regulating behavior of the free market where acting in ones self interest produces socially beneficial results (the term was most used during the greed is good 1980's). Smith's metaphor proposes that individuals efforts for personal profit will positively effect society as the rich create a trickle down effect effect through employment and their own consumption creating demand. And the power of the every day consumer will be exercising thier choices to determine the success or failure of a product or service.  Sounds balanced and legit. Not.