Forage

Abstract

What is worth collecting? How do we honour perceived value? Who decides how we classify and display artifacts? What sort of stories do specific collections tell? In this paper, I explore some of the social determinants of my artistic practice, track the things that matter to me, and account for the ways my everyday lived experience seeps into and informs my work. I situate the transdisciplinary terrain of my history alongside an engagement with contemporary artists who collect a diverse assortment of materials such as Mark Dion, Barry McGee, and Lyndal Osborne. Forage seeks to inspire a reflective response from viewers, possibly eliciting memories of their own collecting endeavours, the thrill of the find, and how these selected materials embody the energy of their existence. By intervening in art-historical and museum-based systems of knowledge-making and keeping, I wish to attract viewers by intentionally leveraging an elegant aesthetic and merging natural history with its intrinsic ecological wisdom alongside repurposed mass-produced objects. The content and layout of this installation are driven by an evocative impulse to arrange by size, shape, colour, and utility through a deep-seated trust in my intuition and skill set. This work and approach revitalize in me a sense of wonder for the world we live in, its beauty, fragility, and complexity and the urgency of caring for it.