Every Brilliant Eye: Australian Art of the 1990s

You have to admire an artist who volunteers ‘dick-and-balls’ doodles as art. Indeed, the pink and plump phalluses of Jeff Gibson’s Screwballs (1992) engage in an irreverent critique typical of Australian art in the 1990s. Laughing at the highbrow definitions of ego that accompany the images, his compositions tweak the tension between instinct and intellect in our desire to define sexual identities. Gibson’s posters, and many other works in ‘Every Brilliant Eye’ reflect how the urban art of the 90s was do-it-yourself, in-your-face and not afraid to shout about it.

Of course DIY has a political edge and proclivity for protest; the reassembly of colonial images in photographic compositions by Gordon Bennett and Leah King-Smith fixed our attention to representation and racism in Australia. As part of the counter-colonial art movement, their work formed an important renegotiation of Aboriginal identity as legal battles for land rights waged throughout the decade. Cross-cultural colonial revision occurs in Juan Davila’s Portrait of Bungaree (1991), a vibrant image forged from religious symbols and historic cues from colonial portraiture.

Installation views ‘Every Brilliant Eye: Australian Art of the 1990s’ exhibition at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia, 2017. Photograph: Tom D Watson

Femininity, masculinity and other positions along the gender and sexuality spectrum are explored in the show with Rosslynd Piggott’s Conversation (1995) warning of the dangers of oppositional binaries. Two cotton nightdresses rise from the same long reel of pristine fabric. Red thread stretches across the divide, forming opposing thoughts on the chest of each garment. Labels that bind one to the other are at the forefront; yes answers no, me opposes you, homme mirrors femme. Julia Rrap’s Vital statistics (1997) transcribes the false boundaries of femininity through performance, photography and sculpture, while A cyberfeminist manifesto for the 21st century (1992) by the VNS Matrix revels in optimistic fervour for the new millennium. The copulation calls of Viral Pulse (1992) by Maria Kozic and Philip Brophy herald the club culture of the 90s. Douglas McManus’ hairy suit Hair Couture (2000), pants optional, is a kind of hirsute uniform for modern masculinity; a disguise for the follicle-challenged and non-conforming.

Rosslynd Piggott, Conversation (detail), 1995, cotton nightdresses, wire coathangers, cotton thread (a-c) 215 x 900 x 500cm (variable) (installation) National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. Purchased through The Art Foundation of Victoria with the assistance of the Moët and Chandon Art Acquisition Fund, Governor, 1996, 1996.179.a-c. © Rosslynd Piggott Photograph: Tom D Watson

Grunge artists such as Mikala Dwyer transformed readymade materials, like in I. O. U. (1997-98), a multi-media assemblage of fur, resin and an analogue television set. Pop culture iconography was recycled in Ricky Swallow’s Model for a sunken monument (1999), featuring a drowning Darth Vader, and David McDiarmid’s Standard bold condensed (1994) where gay pornography and HIV/AIDS headlines are emblazoned over images of Barbie and Bart Simpson.

Art collectives have a strong presence throughout this exhibition. The seminal work Punchline by DAMP was re-enacted for the first time since the original performance in 1999. A grainy, lo-res video documents the shock of visitors as a gallery opening goes terribly wrong. A lovers’ tiff descends into violence until the farce is finally revealed. Original members of the group restaged the work for this retrospective, signifying the enduring relationships and agency that collectives provided to emerging artists in the wake of a financial recession and funding cuts.

Jaqueline Riva and Geoff Lowe, A Constructed World, Artfan 1993–art magazine
Collection of the artists, Paris. Photograph: Tom D Watson

The publications ‘ArtFan’, ‘circular’ and ‘rubik 2’ displayed alongside experimental works by Marco Fusinato and Julia Gorman is a refreshing change. It shows the breadth of artistic output, interdisciplinary and multi-media ambitions of artists at the time. In a pre-digital age, print media provided a platform for emerging artists to debate and document their work, serial titles were a banner under which artists could unite their voices in discord.

Australia in the 1990s battled a hangover from the 1980s while debating a national identity worthy of the new millennium. Fluid gender, sexualities and new technologies clashed with the vagaries of urban living. ‘Every Brilliant Eye’ is a reminder that while some things change, some stay the same.

Liv Spiers is a writer based in Adelaide.

The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia
Until 1 October, 2017
Melbourne

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