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BROOK ANDREW
NGAJUU WANT TO BELIEVE An installation with sound, presenting three 'locales' within the gallery - a blue easy chair positioned in a spot of light (a birdcage hanging near it cast a large, stretched shadow on the wall). From this viewers moved to a three-seater bench spotlit further within the gallery - immediately before it and within its pool of light - three identically sized stacks of paper. A sound system was positioned on the far wall opposite. A sound-loop delivered three elements: contemplative silence, some sounds that are whales singing or communicating, and a girlish voice singing "Love is like a butterfly". Each stack of paper was printed with a phrase in English - The Good Side, The Bad Side, The Other Side - and an aboriginal dialect 'equivalent' for, respectively, sunrise, sunset, time of thunder. This was a theatrical situation but did not declaim to its audience, instead presenting themes you could choose to think about: the good side, the bad side, the other side. How would you like to see things - good? bad? or more openly 'other'? The introduction of Indigenous references is generally unsettling, tending initially to call up defensively-held responses. The work sought to move the viewer beyond polarised and inflexible thinking. "What sort of response do you want to have to these issues?", the work seemed to ask calmly. The installation was made particularly in response to Australia's reception of 'the Boat People' - a counter to the 'evil' encouraged by popular media's production of fear and assertively violent rejection. Ken Bolton Ken Bolton A tri-fold A5 catalogue was produced with texts by Chris Chapman and the artist. |
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above: documentation: installation detail |
Documentation Photography by Alan Cruickshank |