DistoMorph in Dogwood Crossing, Miles

Early last Wednesday morning I loaded up the ute with all my artworks and awaited the arrival of Emily – life-long friend who was tasked with being my everything for the duration; chauffer, installation assistant, and general handler for the latest incarnation of my exhibition DistoMorph at Dogwood Crossing, Miles. 

Dogwood Crossing, Miles

Not only did she excel at all tasks, but we had a wonderful time together. It felt like a special trip in many ways. As the third incarnation of this show, there was a certain level of chill, in that we had ironed out a lot of the issues. (Except for Kaleidolichen. That was still a challenge – however its want to buckle inspired me to embrace and encourage that tendency, so I sewed some tension stitches across the back of the pieces for some curvature.)

Em and her eternal battle with Kaleidolichen

The start of the installation process is always a mixture of excitement and uncertainty, especially when you have a team of people ready to help, talking and asking questions. But it doesn’t take long for things to start coming together – a black wall, a large piece – once the obvious placements occur it all starts coming together. There were some really exciting changes for this one though, with HyperPsybient getting off a plinth and making it onto the wall for the first time, and Expirata having an even more dynamic hang than its last. I’ll be writing more about this particular evolution in my Situation Svenja article in Textile Fibre Forum. 

 HyperPsybient

 Expirata

Sensus Syndrome

Sensus Syndrome looked the best I have seen it, and Polymorphene inverted the concave corner position it had in Gympie to span one convexly (yes, I've checked, that IS a word).

Polymorphene

We actually got a lot done on the Wednesday that we arrived, and after enjoying an early morning walk around town on Thursday morning I left Emily in charge as Claudia took me to the local high school to teach the first of my workshops. Now I think you all know that children are not my favourite humans, but this was really quite alright, with some stellar responses from some of the students. 

Em and I were thrilled to finish up the install that afternoon, and celebrated with a drink and some nibbles in the beautiful streetscapes of Miles, and some truck watching for this tragic lover of Kenworths and Western Stars, before another early night. 

Em re-hanging Aftermath in front of her favourite work, Stratasymbiosis

Me working on hanging Stratasymbiosis

I took advantage of the morning to not only take photos of the works (still learning to drive the new camera) but to get Em to take some portrait shots of me – oooh – add photographer to that list! Of course, she did a stellar job, and we have a wonderful range of shots to choose from. 

Portrait shots in front of Randallarion

After a beautiful lunch at our digs at Windsor Hotel, we visited the local Vinnies, where we found the pricing system to be basically $3 or $1, and came away with a bundle of purchases. I managed a good nap before it was time to get ready for the opening which was well attended – even the local constabulary were there! 

Part of why this edition of DistoMorph felt so special was the fact that I felt calm, happy in what I was presenting, and proud. I appreciated my work in new ways, and felt as though I had accomplished what I had set out to achieve. I didn’t prepare a speech – I spoke comfortably and knowledgeably about my work and its evolution since I was there with my previous exhibition in December 2023. I felt very at ease talking to people in the exhibition, and their enthusiasm, understanding and interest was very gratifying, as was recognition by some visitors of the development since my last exhibition. It’s as though I reached a new level of validation and confidence, with a definite sense of satisfaction with my progress. 

I enjoyed hearing one viewer's response that they appreciated all the titles - I took a lot of time creating these quasi-drug/syndrome/biological names.

Marimonium in front of Randallarion

I had a nice number of attendees for my Saturday morning workshop, and I hope I was able to inspire them with plenty of images of my own and others work and give them some good tips on beginning and navigating the design process for wearable art projects. 

With a long drive ahead of us we hit the road, stopping only to refuel, and to of course, open a beer (not a screw top!). By chance we pulled up right next to this fabulous sign and impressive grass verge.

Since my return to the studio, I have begun my own Residency - see the blog I posted earlier this week. To keep myself on track, I'm reporting my work on Instagram each day, so follow along there to watch my progress.

 

Plastic Fantastic Residency 2025!

Since returning from installing DistoMorph in Dogwood Crossing, Miles, I have settled into my freshly tidied studio to begin my self-awarded, self-hosted and self-funded residency on working with plastic!

 For the month of June I will be focusing on creating with plastic bottles, expanding on my previous work with soldering irons, heat guns, butane torches, fluid acrylic paint, alchohol ink, and exploring 3d pen printing. 

Soldering iron etching

Heat gun, butane torch, and alcohol inks

I first bought a 3d printing pen around five years ago, and created some elements of my exhibition Algalrhythms with it. The PETG plastic filament I was using was very brittle though, and unsuitable for many applications, and I didn’t pursue it. Flexible filament was available then, but was limited to the 3Doodler brand. For those that are unfamiliar with the technology, it's kind of like drawing with a glue gun.(Ive also tried working with a glue gun - also pretty excited about including that.)

Glue gun on organze, with silver paint highlight

Barnacles made from 3D printing pen drawn over a ball

Karina Bond, Instagram

However, I recently saw the work of Karina Bond and had another look into it, and lo! there have been developments, and flexible TPU filament is now available. So I bought myself seven 1kg rolls of brightly coloured transparent filament, and this morning had my first trial. It’s one of those things that takes you a while to slip into the groove of, so I just need to keep practicing. In many ways it is like free-motion embroidery, as you have to consider making a joining structure as you work so it hangs together. You can work it over a shaped base, which I tried today over a metal ladle, and over one of my distorted plastic bottle pieces. They easily peel off.

Inspiration board for plastic waves

The office corkboard of inspiration images and samples has undergone a revamp, and I’ve even done a wee one down in the wet studio with a piece of Styrofoam that fortuitously blew in over the weekend! I’m keen to pursue an idea that I proposed for Swell Sculpture Festival which wasn’t accepted, but I think has a lot of potential, and was probably not best presented at the time.

 I’d also like to create a special piece for DistoMorph’s time in Maryborough next year, as my brief residency there at Gatakers Artspace last year helped drive this project.

A sample worked at Gatakers Artspace

I've also been keenly watching Swapna Namboodiri, who does some really imaginitavie work with recycled plastic - I believe she is a finalist in the Australian Wearable Art Festival in August, so I'll be looking forward to seeing her entry there.

The sandwich toaster which I bought for the studio has returned after a brief sojourn to the kitchen - it is now doing what it is supposed to, and melting plastic milk bottle lids.

So I'd better get back in there and get creating!

Post-WOW deadline crash 2025

I think I forgot to anticipate the crash that comes after making the WOW deadline.

Maybe because I haven’t experienced it for five years, maybe because I thought having successfully navigated the creation and touring of two exhibitions might have made it less intense, maybe because ovarian retirement is holding the reigns right now. But last Thursday I physically and mentally crashed. Lower back issues I’ve been dealing with got out of control, meaning I couldn’t do what I normally do, in any way. Lying down and feeling sorry for myself, unmotivated to create and wondering if my weightlifting life was now over, I sunk further into the doldrums, wondering what was the point of creating anything, everything was so fucked up in this completely crazy world, where I no longer know what should be believed, or is even real.

Teetering on the edge, I threw myself a line, assuring myself that this was just a blip, and all would once again be well. Using some very stern words, I told myself that a glass of bubbles was not the answer, that in fact eating some real food, sleeping, and performing research activities whilst I was physically inactive was a very valid way to spend my time. Come Sunday morning, I knew I had to get back out walking for both physical and mental health. I allowed myself a slower pace than my normal mad techno beat, and made many stops to photograph fungus and lichen. By the end of the walk my back was feeling a lot better, and I was so inspired that I was  back in my usual quandry of where to start and which way to go, as I had eleventy-million ideas for print, paint, and embroidery works. Sometimes I don’t know which end of the spectrum is more exhausting! I'd love to play with more of my images like this...

I think it’s a timely reminder though, to slow down the frantic pace that life seems to have ramped up to. I always feels as though there just aren’t enough hours – I guess though that there never will be. I need some slow activities to contrast with the high energy ones – in fact I’ve just checked out my first batch of books from the library since COVID put an end to that habit. For someone who finds it hard to get the time to read the magazine I actually write for and love, this is going to take some work. Much as I find the internet brilliant for research, I admit that I can find myself endlessly scrolling, wasting time and getting over-stimulated. Currently I'm trying to figure out how I feel about generative AI.....

My exhibition DistoMorph is showing at Gympie Art Gallery until the 10th May, as you can see in this article in the Gympie Times. 

But I loved receiving this notification today even more than that coverage - being tagged in this story by a visitor! So many people never sign the visitors book, or just don't write anything meaningful- this is great!

 My Artist Talk presentation has now been uploaded to my website - it's a very casual discussion of the techniques and materials I use in creation of my works - check it out here.

Next stop after this is Dogwood Crossing, Miles in May.