Dreamweavers,
18 May 2011 - 18 Nov 18 2013
Gippsland Art Gallery & NETS touring exhibition
curated by Simon Gregg
Dreamweavers explores art and the subconscious in a strange and enchanting journey through the world of dreams, nightmares and the imagination. The exhibition charts the contemporary propagation of Surrealism through a range of national and international art practices that are at once diverse, and united by an enduring fascination with darkness and dark places.
Dreamweavers is a multi-sensory experience that combines sculpture, assemblage, photography, painting and moving image, in a hypnotic melange of form, content and meaning. With each respective practice based on personal and subjective experience, visitors to Dreamweavers will enjoy a powerful encounter with ‘otherness’. The works, while often born of everyday materials, give a sense of being not of this world.
Dreamweavers is designed to bring the magic and mystery of theatre into the art gallery. Essential to the exhibition experience is a de-sterilisation of the gallery environment, and a visceral and thrilling engagement with the art works. Dreamweavers has more in common with a theme park than a traditional art exhibition. Children will be captivated by ideas that bend the imagination, while adults may consider the deeper issues at stake.
While the exhibition investigates Neo-Surrealist concerns it also explores the contemporary interest in the Gothic. Dreamweavers recalls horror films as well as film noir, mysticism, spiritualism and the occult. It courts the defiant thread of irrational and sublime phenomena that infiltrates everyday life.
2013 Western Plains Cultural Centre, New South Wales
2012 Ararat Regional Art Gallery, Victoria
2012 Redland Art Gallery, Queensland
2012 Devonport Regional Gallery, Tasmania
2012 Swan Hill Regional Art Gallery, Victoria
2011 Maitland Regional Gallery, New South Wales
2011 McClelland Gallery & Sculpture Park, Victoria
2011 Gippsland Art Gallery, Sale