re/impressions
In response to recent crises that have shaped the Australian environmental, cultural and sociopolitical landscape Nicolette Axiak and Jelena Sinik collaborated on re/impressions.
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Produced by Boyd Britton and exhibited at the Chrissie Cotter Gallery (September 19 - October 6 2024) the installations are an expansion of their animated films Forever or for Now? and 101 Days of Lockdown.
1896 hours
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The 2019-20 Australian bushfires lasted 79 days.
1896 hours is an installation artwork that illuminates the devastating scale of the Black Summer bushfires, with each individual pink flannel flower representing each of the 1896 hours our country burned.
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The complete works of Henry Lawson provide a unique substrate for the petals, which glimpse fragments of his prolific writings about the harsh and often brutal nature of life on Australian land. 1896 hours is as much about hope as it is about devastation, as the handmade flowers express a sense of renewal in their transformative deconstruction of Lawson's writings.
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This emphasis on the written word contemplates the importance of language, storytelling and rememberance in the process of healing. The artists' painstaking and meticulous commitment to the handmade process for each flower impresses upon the slow and arduous nature of regeneration.
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101 Days of Lockdown
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101 Days of Lockdown is an experimental exploration into the mundane and domestic moments of aloneness that made up the human experience of the 2021 Australian pandemic lockdowns. The split screen film follows the lives of two best friends, 40km apart and on opposite sides of Sydney.
The unique format of one second of animation per day, creates a social document of the moods and moments that constituted both the similarities and differences of life in the Western and Eastern Suburbs during this strange time.
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The film was presented as an installation, screened on dual computer monitors representing the two concurrent stories from Western and Eastern Sydney.
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Artist statements written by Jelena Sinik
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