249. Henry Lewis | Breathing over hair

10 May - 13 June

Henry Lewis’ photograph is not so much a photograph of something as it is something constructed as a photograph. And while Henry is reluctant to discuss his process it’s easy to imagine his work being made on a computer in a program like photoshop where the limitations imposed by our physical reality don’t exist. In an interview about a previous body of work he said “I like the French word Bricolage which is the art of ‘do it yourself’, for me it is constructing an ephemeral piece from things that I find at hand and then, after photographic capture, its de-construction and demolition.” Here, as is the case with a great deal of art, the photograph doesn’t represent reality, it is a reality in its own right.

With this in mind the title of Henry’s work, Breathing over hair is surprisingly literal. They are photographs of hair here and over them, arranged in a sort of animated checkerboard, photographs of breath. More correctly they are photographs of the condensation within a breath, exhaled in a very cold place. Think of winter in France where Henry lived for many years or Bowral when he lives now. These are Henry’s breaths exhaled he said at about 14 times a minute, captured as a photograph before being given a “human” pink colouring and arranged in a manner that for me implies a pacing from one side of the picture to the next.

It’s hard not to think of there being a first breath that we understand to be accompanied by a cry and then a last breath that we hope is exhaled in silence. There might be the breath over hair in the passionate embrace of a lover or across the hair of another on our solitary rush hour train ride home. Here, as is the case with a great deal of art, literal meaning rests in an evocation of humanity, of breath and hair devoid of any instructive ideology or our pragmatic response to it.

Two similar works by Henry are included in an exhibition, Confluence at the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre, 26 April – 14 June. The catalogue essay observes, “There are 3 dimensions in Henry Lewis’ works. The first is the pictorial depth in which a single breath is represented…The second consists of the lines of surface composition in which each breath is set…the third is the rectangular shape also on the surface…One pictorial and two surface dimensions…an actual space and a map of breathing.” This is a constructed space as might be found in collage or bricolage or a contemporary digital version of it where the physical and conceptual constraints of reality do not apply. This reality is an invention.

250. Bernadette Ryan | Moving figures

14 June - 18 July

Bernadette Ryan is a teacher and a student. She completed a BA Fine Arts at Middlesex University in London, then a PG Diploma in Animation. Travelled to Sydney where she worked as a web designer and for the last 11 years, she has been a teacher with Studio Artes in Sydenham. But it’s her studies at the Tom Bass School of Sculpture in Erskineville that has given rise to this, Bernadette’s first exhibition.

While studying the figure as a sculptural subject Bernadette found herself considering the figure in motion. The model's movement from one pose to the next as opposed to the model's static pose that might usually be seen as the subject of sculpture.

Bernadette is not alone in choosing movement across time as the subject of art. It was an art movement called Futurism a century ago. In the media we are constantly watching time expand and contract. Some of us find a meditative space while walking. Others delight in mechanical transport from bicycles to sports cars where movement becomes an exotic delight, simultaneously necessary, dangerous and exhilarating - in a word, sexy.

It’s easy to think of these forms as figures, distorted by their movement through space and time. In time there was where they were, where they will be, and in a moment now. A meditative abstraction that is appropriate to SLOT where our audience is generally moving. Walking past, glancing at the window without breaking stride, passing in a car or on a bus or caught at the traffic lights, suspended in the hiatus of now, a moment that apparently lasts an entire lifetime.

251. Kendal Heyes | Turning tide

19 July - 22 August

Kendal Heyes came from New Zealand. He studied photography, painting, drawing and sculpture in Sydney until he competed a PhD. This work was previously exhibited in the Wollongong City Gallery and in line with his studies it bends a photograph through various digital drawing-like processes into a thin paper sculpture.

For this iteration of the work Kendal has imbedded the Palestinian flag in its sculptural fabric, and provided the title, Turning tide. Kendal feels that the tide of global opinion is changing on the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people of Gaza and the West Bank. He comments, “to show the flag is to stand against the obliteration of Palestine by Israel.” Immediately the work asks for a moral judgment, then we might wonder, if global opinion can change as the tide does, is morality mutable? And of course it is, the shifting ground of cancel culture confirms it.

The presentation of political concerns as art confronts a harsh dichotomy. Is our appreciation of the art conditioned by our political views, or does art condition our political views? It’s easy to see the mood of propaganda coloured by art. Religious art has similar parameters although occasional it achieves a glorious evocation of humanity where questions of right and wrong are suspended. But can we suspend moral judgments in an evocation of humanity when our appreciation of art is dictated by our political views?

The reality of politics remains as does the devastation that engulfs the Palestinian people. Surely it is beyond questions of right, wrong, good and bad? Must it remain the consequence of contested colonisation that like the tide washing in and out repeats cycles of inalienable entitlement?