Unfinished: Décor is an ongoing project experimenting with spatial, material, temporal and narrative structures drawn out of historic conceptual-art contexts. The project resists the traditional boundaries that govern artistic presentation and actively seeks to emphasise porosity, precariousness and doubt as strategies for reflection.
Robert Mangion and Peter Burke invited artists Damiano Bertoli, Elizabeth Newman and David Thomas to respond to the notion of the unfinished in art. Together they trace connections between individual work processes that engage with notions of the unfinished, dealing with the indefinite postponement of closure and making inaccessible the object of certainty. The artists attempt to establish contexts by which the art object cannot be edified or concluded. Instead, there is a bid to establish deeper ontological structures through which artworks are revealed.
Unfinished: Décor draws upon the last work by Marcel Broodthaers entitled Décor: A Conquest (1974). Broodthaers’ exhibition was spread over two rooms and formed a temporary structure that framed the artworks as objects in a precarious way. Contemplation of his installation opens various conceptual dialogues for a renewed approach in Unfinished: Décor. It expands on art’s tactile engagement with the gallery as non-space, the proximity to past and present temporal modes of presentation, the tautness between subject and object interactions, and a post-medium shift to a performative ontology as art practice. Unfinished: Décor develops a curatorial structure from this set of ideas, locating notions of contemporaneity from the passive notion of ‘being in time’ to an active notion of temporal disjunction.
Curated by Peter Burke and Robert Mangion.
Exhibition:
Blindside ARI,
7/37 Swanston Street, Melbourne
13 May - 15 June 2019
blindside.org.au/unfinished-decor
Photography: Roberta Govoni
Unfinished: Décor is the second iteration of an unfolding project experimenting with spatial, material, temporal and narrative structures drawn out of historic conceptual-art contexts. The project actively seeks to emphasise porosity, precariousness and doubt as strategies for reflection.
Robert Mangion and Peter Burke invited artists Damiano Bertoli and David Thomas to respond to the notion of the unfinished in art. Together they trace connections between individual work processes that engage with notions of the unfinished, dealing with the indefinite postponement of closure and making inaccessible the object of certainty. The artists attempt to establish contexts by which the art object cannot be edified or concluded. Instead, there is a bid to establish deeper ontological structures through which artworks are revealed.
The exhibition included a floor piece by Peter Burke, Robert Mangion and David Thomas entitled Fifteen Dispositions–placed–altered_moved (2019). At the opening event, Peter Burke and Robert Mangion presented a performative lecture Unfinished: Foam Quiddity (2019).
Curated by Peter Burke and Robert Mangion.
Exhibition:
AIRspace Projects
!0 Junction Street, Marrickville, Sydney
4 - 19 October 2019
airspaceprojects.com.au
Photography: Campbell Henderson
Unfinished: Search for the Miraculous (2017) is initiated by Peter Burke and Robert Mangion who have developed a curatorial model for a group exhibition at Five Walls Projects. The project is in part mentorship and in part a discursive platform for experimentation with spatial, material and narrative structures, drawn out of a historic conceptual art context.
Unfinished: Search for the Miraculous draws from a subject critical to art practice: the question of when a work of art is finished. The project examines the term ‘unfinished’ in its broadest sense, including works left incomplete by their makers, which often give insight into the cryptic process of their creation. In this project, the unfinished is explored in cross-disciplinary ways, blurring the distinction between making and un-making, and extending the boundaries between beginnings and endings.
Participating artists: Robert Mangion, Peter Burke, Lauren Kennedy, Marcel Feillafe and Denise Honan.
Exhibition:
Five Walls Projects, Footscray
21 September—7 October 2017.
Photography: Marcel Feillafe.
Artist book: Click here
In 2018 The Bureau for the Organisation of Origins (BOO) presented an exhibition of political posters gathered in response to a public call-out. The posters addressed numerous topical themes from indigenous rights, gender equality, mining and fracking to more personal issues.
Curated by Peter Burke and Ben Sheppard for the AAANZ Conference.
Creative Spaces
RMIT University
Melbourne
5–7 December 2018
Photography: Samira Ghasempour
Pursuit is a portable gallery installed inside a tailored suit jacket, briefcase and hat. Director Peter Burke markets blue chip investments to buyers absolutely everywhere. Over 100 artists have been represented in impromptu and commissioned exhibitions at the Melbourne Art Fair (2010, 2012), India Art Fair (2012), Margaret Lawrence Gallery (2012) India Art Fair [in collaboration with Gallerie Nature Morte] (2013) and Art Stage Singapore (2013). Forget Gagosian, Saachi and Schwartz. Think Pursuit.
Photography: Samira Ghasempour
Pop-Dot Apple (2016-17) is a participatory art project by Keigo Ogaswara, a sculptor based in Japan. Since 2011 Keigo has hand crafted more than 1300 ceramic apples. In a simple gesture, he gives each apple away, and invites the recipient to take a photograph of their apple. He then displays the photographs within exhibitions and on social media. For Kiego, each individual apple represents a connection with a person, and the 1300+ apples form a pattern of dots on a collective map linking people from all around the world,
Curated by Peter Burke, Pop-Dot Apple features apples Keigo gifted to Melburnians, together with contributions from participants in Japan.
Supported by Victoria University.
Exhibition:
Vitrine, 300 Flinders Street, Melbourne
20 February—14 April 2017
Laura Falduto (2016)
Attaché Case (2015-18) is an exhibition of 41 miniature artworks inside a low cost diplomatic bag. Peter Burke invited asylum seekers and refugees in Melbourne to create artworks that addressed their refugee experience. The artists come from countries including Afghanistan, Columbia, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Poland, Sri Lanka and Vietnam. In their artworks they explored diverse issues about detainment, political policies, optimism and waiting. Many artists wrote messages on the reverse of their artwork. The project [poignantly] captures the personal experience of refugees and gives voice to those who are seldom heard or seen.
Attaché Case was commissioned by the Spanish Embassy in Australia for Low Cost Diplomatic Bag, an exhibition curated by Nilo Casares, featuring 16 international artists who presented their nearest Spanish embassy with their own version of a diplomatic bag. The exhibition visited various locations in Europe and South America.
Attaché Case now resides at Museum Victoria in Melbourne.
Attaché Case artists include: Mitra Ashanti, Neda Daryabar, Alyana Eau, Duane (Noony) Falconer, BHR, Sririhan Ganeshan, Dagmara Gieysztor, Tadros Hanna,Khadija Haydari, Sakhidad Haydari, Zohreh Izadikia, Mehdi Jaghuri, Carmenza Jimenez Osorio, Azizeh Khademi, Mahelyeh Kalhour, Samaneh Malekshahi, Gyorgyi Marek, Margaret Mayhew, Minh Phan, Anthony Rodriguez, Eghbal Saki, Rayka, M.S., Maryam Sepasi, Honey & Azizeh.
2019 marks the 20th anniversary of the Fiona Myer Awards at Victoria University. To celebrate this milestone, eight artists, all previous Award recipients, were invited to create new work for an exhibition at White Story. In keeping with her passion for all things white, Fiona Myer asked artists to respond to the concept of ‘white’. At White Story white is an overall aesthetic that strips away clutter, with a focus on simplicity, timelessness, effortlessness, memorable craftsmanship and design.
The Japanese designer Kenya Hara observes that there is no such thing as white, only the sensibility that allows us to experience whiteness. ‘White is not colour, but sensibility or mentality, and one way to approach white is by collecting and arranging various white phenomena’ (100 Whites, 2018).
The artists in the exhibition employ diverse materials and forms—including textiles, painting, sculpture and installation—to examine an infinite range of meanings attached to white. Their ideas draw from contemporary culture, history, legend and personal experience to investigate psychological expressions of absence and loss, explorations of gender, and critiques of power. Whether white is presented as a state of clarity, a condition of ambiguity, a place of coexistence, or a liminal space, the artists invite us to reflect upon the nuances and complexity of whiteness. Perhaps, by the time you view the works in the exhibition, white will look different to you, and you may see our world in a new light.
[Peter Burke]
White Story
Cremorne, Melbourne
18—21 November 2019
Participating artists:
Karryn Argus, Jodie Flugge, Denise Honan, Lauren Kennedy, En-En See, Sophie Shingles, Lin Tobias and Sy Yoo.
Curator: Peter Burke.
Photography: Samira Ghasempour
