Window Exhibition: Tues May 26 – Sat June 20, 2009
Meredith Turnbull: Some become strangers
Meredith Turnbull: Some become strangers
Some become strangers is the first collection of jewellery by artist Meredith Turnbull to be exhibited at Piece of Eight gallery. Turnbull’s artistic practice is multifaceted, involving jewellery, objects, photography, video and installation. Largely inspired by abstraction, there is a high level of conceptual consideration that simultaneously intrigues and eludes.
Meredith is a Melbourne based visual artist, jeweller, writer and curator. She completed a Bachelor of Arts with Honours in Art History, Latrobe University, 2000, followed by a Bachelor of Fine Art (Gold and Silversmithing), RMIT University, 2005. She edited the online magazine ACCAMag, 2004-2005 and was Project Manager/Assistant to the Artistic Director at ACCA from 2003-2005. Meredith is currently a member of the Next Wave Festival’s Curatorial Advisory Committee and Gallery Manager/Curator of the VCA Margaret Lawrence Gallery.
A range of necklaces, brooches and small objects will be exhibited in the Pieces of Eight window, visible 24 hours daily, Tues May 26 – Sat June 20, 2009.
An interview with Meredith Turnbull
1. Can you talk a little about the title of the exhibition, Some become strangers?
'Some become strangers' is a Stevie Nick’s song that I love. It’s quite poetic, it’s about love, specifically the loss of it or the loss of someone who was once close. More abstractly, I often think of my objects and jewellery as animate, some of which are like living beings I know well, others emerge as a complete surprise to me and are like strangers, or strangers to their environment.
2. In relation to your jewellery pieces you have spoken about “activating” the surface so it “appears as an entirely different material.” Can you discuss this approach?
One of the ways I like to start making is by experimenting with heavy card and paper, cutting, folding and putting together forms. I find the material quality of paper interesting, how it holds a crease or a bend – its sense of plastic memory. I also respond to metal in the same way and try to imbue metal with a papery feel. I guess I also try to activate the whole form as well as the surface, this is why I often hand-paint my work so the eye is attracted to the whole, the shape and line, like a small sculpture rather than perhaps first noticing if it is silver or gold.
3. Scale is a very important aspect of your making. How does it inform your practice?
Scale always informs my practice, but is more apparent when you see other aspects of my work. I often photograph small-scale sculpture to give it the appearance of large-scale work, I love the idea that a piece of jewellery can be monumental, like a Richard Serra or a Sol LeWitt sculpture.
4. In relation to your broader art practice you have spoken about creating “architectonic spaces.” Does this relate to your jewellery work also?
All of my work, in some way, responds to architecture. I’m drawn to Modernist and Brutalist architecture, to the lines and planes of a building, and the different materials used in construction. My interest in architecture forms a sort of undercurrent that affects the jewellery and small-scale sculpture I make. More generally I enjoy thinking about how the architecture of a city affects its inhabitants. I think of my jewellery as something live, growing or living within these spaces.
5. You have described “bringing a material to life” inspired by the Gutai artists Manifesto of the 1950’s. What does this mean to you now, working as a contemporary artist?
I often look to past and present movements in art for inspiration. Gutai focuses on an inherent essence in a material, the idea of presenting the material raw. So I don’t adhere to it in a strict sense but borrow from it some ideas including the desire to embrace the natural decay or wear of a material or an object. I think the interests of Gutai translate more broadly into embracing what is inherent in material and working with it.
6. In terms of exploring both traditional art and craft practices you have spoken about “folding conditions” of craft and art. Can you discuss your ideas around this a little?
I like to conceptually and physically combine my photography and video practice with jewellery, sculpture and installation and vice versa, that’s where the fold occurs. Art and craft aren’t static modes of practice. I enjoy making conversions between them.
7. What’s your current favourite website/blog or online activity?
I can’t live without email and Skype at the moment, but probably it’s to watch documentation of 1960s and 1970s video and performance works on UBU. I also love checking out Melbourne’s daily temperate on the BOM.
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