2023 Exhibitions
Elena Murgia, MIND+MATER
4 November - 17 December 2023
About the exhibition:
As a fashion designer in Italy driven by both fabrics and beauty I often wrangled with the dichotomy between quality and image. Image can be compelling, playful, even ephemeral and too easily can become shallow. Quality is, for me, a given, the true substance of things without which inner beauty is absent.
In today’s world the tension of this dualism is all around us.
Tension was always present in my best work and as I started to sculpt in ceramic, marble, bronze and other materials the play between an authentic inner elegance and the masks we wear to face the outside world continue to be the engine of my creative process.
MIND+MATER is a body of work that explores the perception and value - the fabric - of womankind.
The image of woman is perennially defined by men through art and fashion for her biological and erotic value alone. Giacometti’s “Spoon Woman”, 1927, evokes the silhouette of the female form where the spoon represents the womb and hips that nourish humanity.
Nearly a century later, social media empowers women to redefine their own version of beauty, yet too often their worth is reduced to lips and curves. Among the influencers then, continue to lurk past male generations, still confining women to the role of life carriers and erotic objects.
This exhibition aims to celebrate women, yes, as givers of life but importantly, for once, as feeders of the mind. Think about that.
About the artist:
Graduating in Fashion Design at Florence University, Italy, Elena Murgia began working with ceramics in London in 2013 and relocated to Sydney in 2017 where her practice is primarily in bronze, marble and ceramics.
Her sculptures are psychological portraits, inviting the viewer’s own intimate interpretation.
Elena sums it up: “My interest is the human - more often the female - psychology related to its necessity to be beautiful, but also to escape from the shackle of women’s representation seen through a male gaze”.
Director’s Choice
23 September - 20 October 2023
The Director’s Choice Exhibition features sculptures that were selected from the 2023 Annual Studio Exhibition by TBSSS Treasurer and wife of Tom Bass AM, Margo Hoekstra, with assistance from TBSSS Chair Carol Crawford.
The exhibition featured TBSSS students: Michela Caffagna, Caroline Choker, Rhonda Cooper, Christophe Cornard, Simon Gandevia, Ned Johnson, Benjamin Kirby, Min Kong, Ming Lum, Mojirade Odeleye, Emmanuel Pertsoulis, Brenda Toole and Tony Wong Hee.
The winners of the 2023 Prizes were: Director's Choice Prize: Brendan Toole & People's Choice Prize: Letitia Tunmore.
Precious Little Objects, a fundraising exhibition
24 August - 8 September 2023
Precious Little Objects was a fundraising exhibition to raise funds for the Studio. Funds from the sales of the sculptures will go towards our scholarship program which supports youth and artists with a disability. Funds will also help subsidise the costs of the life study program, an important teaching legacy of Tom Bass AM.
Exhibition artists included: Helen Alajajian, Peter Bartlett, Wendy Black, Carol Crawford, Christine Crimmins, Simon Gandevia, Margo Hoekstra, Paul Hopmeier, Jules Jones, Ingrid Morley Jenny Pollak, Monika Scarrabelotti and Tony Wong Hee.
We thank the artist for their generosity in donating their works.
Steel Works: an exhibition by Chris Atichian, Wendy Holz and Christopher Salvemini
23 July - 13 August 2023
About the exhibition:
Steel Works showcases sculptures completed in the medium of steel. Over the past few years, the exhibiting artists have produced varied welded steel works as part of the National Art School short courses program. The exhibited works explore both the physicality and versatility of the medium. Mild steel can be cut, heated, bent and re-assembled into myriad forms. We are fortunate to have access to an outstanding workshop with a shared affinity amongst peers and teachers alike for making sculpture in steel.
About the artists:
Chris Atichian commenced his practice at Tom Bass in 2010. In his steel works, the steel is manipulated at high temperatures and subject to extreme pressure. The process by nature is often unpredictable and the resulting forms acquire an element of being partially self-made. Chris seeks to push the materiality of steel and strives to obtain flesh like folds in the completed forms, such that the material acquires a softness not typically associated with steel.
Wendy Holz first came to classes at Tom Bass in 2015 and started welding steel in 2017. Wendy enjoys the physical nature of the work of welding, grinding and bending steel to build abstract constructions. Each piece is generally a mixture of an original idea worked on by chance, experimentation and an attempt to be precise, especially about weight and balance.
Christopher Salvemini has been a student of TBSSS since 2015, since then he has worked in different sculptural media including clay, plaster, wire and stone. His favourite artistic media include drawing, painting, sculpture, collage and mosaics. Christopher's welded works on display predominantly experiment with line and form in the medium of steel. He enjoys working with the material properties of steel being able to heat, bend, cut and reassemble.
Chris Atichian: After the Storm
5 - 31 March 2023
About Chris and his exhibition:
Chris has been a long-term student at Tom Bass, having commenced in 2009. More recently Chris has been developing a welded steel practice at National Art School. Chris has been a finalist in the Tom Bass Prize twice, and a finalist in the Northern Beaches Art Prize and North Sydney Art Prize on several occasions. Chris was a joint winner of the Northern Beaches Art Prize in 2020.
My practice is physically very intense and “After the Storm” references the calm body of work that remains at the end of the carving or steel working process.
Stone carving is central to my practice, and in particular, I work with different Italian, and occasionally Australian marble. My carving practice has a core focus on fabric and drapery. Fabric and abandoned clothing in these works represent the connections and associations we develop with people through their material and personal possessions, which may endure in our memories beyond a person’s image.
In contrast to the slow and deliberate nature of marble carving, steel provides me with a dynamic alternative in which material can be added and removed relatively quickly.
In my steel work, a lot of the process is performed by working the steel at high temperatures subject to extreme pressure. The process by nature is unpredictable and the resulting forms have an element of being semi-self made, such that my presence sometimes only defines the start and end points of that process. I often strive to obtain flesh like folds in the steel, such that the material acquires a softness not typically associated with steel.
Arielle Morris, Full Fathom Five
6 February - 2 March
Artist Statement
I have two bodies of work displayed in the gallery. The first is a series of portraits of my Birth-Father Kim. Kim died when I was 6 months old, so I have no memories of him. This series is about recapturing his lost image, reclaiming his likeness and feeling closer to him in the process.
The series is titled ‘Full Fathom Five’ after a speech from the Tempest in which the news of Ferdinand’s father’s death is delivered (by the sprite Ariel) This poem speaks of the ocean’s transformational properties - in the poem the transforming force is the sea, but for me it has always been art and my creative process. These lines are especially meaningful:
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
The second body of work is an ode to the TBSSS' incredible life study course. The fundamental lessons I have learnt about the figure have transformed my art making practice. They have given me the strong foundation of figurative language that I believe will serve me for the rest of my artistic career.
About Arielle:
Arielle primarily sculpts the figure in clay and plaster, but also enjoys working in resin and glass. Her work is an examination and celebration of the human form and the potential for emotional expression inherent in the figure. She was a finalist in the Tom Bass Prize for Figurative Sculpture in 2018, and has also taken part in various group shows at the Clara Street Gallery.
Arielle initially trained as a photographer, and has studied at both the National Art School, where she completed her undergraduate degree, as well as Sydney College of the Arts, where she obtained a Masters of Fine Art. She also has a Diploma in Art Therapy and works as a florist.
Simon Gandevia, OLD FOUND AND REMADE
26 November - 31 January
This is a series of pieces sculpted from sandstone and wood. Some were made de novo and others are based on found material such as pieces of burnt wood and rusted steel. Often a piece reveals something unexpected about the material and how it has evolved. There are a couple of sculptural parodies included too.
Hopefully some pieces are interesting and even worth a longer look.
All nett proceeds will be donated to Médecins Sans Frontières Australia.
