The Extraordinary Beauty of Ordinary Things

I moved to Kanimbla in 2010 and was able to build a large industrial shed to use as a studio, since then I have been collecting a great many objects, mainly handheld tools or implements. These objects were not expensive and usually obtained from Opportunity shops, markets or even the tip, sometimes people who know my obsession give me things.

I have made vitrines to contain the objects and they have a presence, they tell stories, I move them around to create conversations between them. The creative rationale is to turn the familiar into something new “to see what is there not already patterned with familiarity” to bring to attention the beauty and wonder of these things. To paraphrase an essay on my work by Gary Sangster I intend to create situations of interconnectedness and coherence across a variety of forms that operate on our senses through careful and precise knowledge of object selection and the chosen materials, as well as through subliminal, referential, and evocative interactions. In previous works I have used a compilation of kitchen and garden tools, glass funnels, woks, etc.

The inventive reuse of familiar domestic equipment reflects the operational logic of the kitchen, garden and workshop. My concerns reflect my interest in the intimacy of personal actions; we have a visceral memory of holding a bowl, of combing hair, of drinking from a cup. My intention is to not only to bring these bodily memories to the surface but also to transform these mundane objects into evocative, imaginative situations, whether photographic or sculptural, and to draw the viewer in and to invite their personal interaction and interpretation. I have been with some of these objects for a long time and finally, perhaps because I have spend so many months/years in the studio looking at them, I feel compelled to work with them.

Anne Graham