Artrave

Hand in Glover
The directors of a group state art museums have been told by a government body that they acted imprudently in seeking to save the taxpayer money in agreeing not to bid against each other for John Glover's Mount Wellington and Hobart town from Kangaroo Point which came up for auction late last year. It was knocked down to the National Gallery of Australia for the reserve price $1.5m. The ACCC and its Chairman Allan Fels says if they want to engage in this kind of action they should seek authorisation from the government, which would give them immunity from the Trade Practices Act, not take matters into their own hands.

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Petr Herel: Drawings, Prints and Artist's Books

holmes à court gallery, East Perth 11 October - 25 November 2001

Dorothy Erickson

Tiffany Parbs

Tiffany Parbs reinterprets 18th century medical tools to create works of small objects which carry with them an implication of an intimate relationship with the body. Parbs is based in South Australia at the JamFactory Contemporary Craft & Design; her project has been assisted by Arts SA and the Australia Council.

Tiffany Parbs

Uniform: Kate Just

Penthouse & Pavement 4 - 26 January 2002

Jazmina Cininas

Vis.Arts.Online

Various websites

Belinda Daw

Willing tenants: Ella Dreyfus and her models

Jane Goodall

The Theatrics of Cloning: The Recent Paintings of Juan Ford

Juan Ford's recent exhibition Clone is a series of portraits of doppelgangers trapped within neo-realistic hallucinatory environments that are rich in attributes taken from technological culture. The juxtaposition of traditional painterly portraiture with objects taken from recent technologies uncovers the sense of mystery that these new technologies provide for us. Trotter looks at Ford's practice within the context of our post-modern society, discussing relevant issues of capitalist culture as 'narcissistic' and the breakdown of a consistent personal identity within it.

Penny Trotter

Ray Cook

Ray Cook is a Brisbane-based photographic artist who has exhibited for 13 years with 20 solo shows to his credit. Cooks work has been primarily concerned with mortality, loss of control and the way gender and sexuality have been perceived in the media. His images are highly theatrical, staged scenarios, a hybrid of performance and still photography.

Ray Cook

Polemic: The Undoing of Art History (Part II)

In Part I (Artlink, December 2001) the subject called Art History was challenged, using the terms art and work of art in a conventional way. Here in Part II it is argued that some of the woes of art theory can be alleviated by understanding these terms in a different way. Brook discusses the role of cultural memes in creating different kinds of historiesand the doctrine of creativity. He here concludes that it is perfectly understandable that, as metaphysical explorers, we may address works of art with little or no respect for the author's intentions. In the end, he states, it depends upon the regularities of the real world.

Donald Brook

Morphologies

Artspace & Ivan Dougherty Gallery, Sydney 22 November - 15 December 2001

Rilka Oakley

The Surgical Fix: Physical Capital, Self-Improvement and the Body Beautiful

Historical studies have shown that an improved physical appearance had profoundly beneficial psychological effects and behavioural outcomes. Plastic surgery became a vital tool in the 1930s, holding out the promise of removing the traces of war and eliminating prominent markers of ethnicity. In recent years the cosmetic surgery industry has grown in Australia, and as with all countries the common goal is the production of a narrowly defined culture of bodily beauty. Ryan looks at the cosmetic surgery industry and some of the artistic responses to such ideas and ideals, particularly those of artist Annabelle Collett.

Victoria Ryan

The Bank West Inaugural Contemporary Art Prize, Perth Institute of Contemporary Art

8 November 2001 - 26 January 2002

David Dolan

Sympathetic Magic: Skin and Canvas

The skin, the membrane, the corporeal envelope, the shroud, the veil - all those things that tend to separate and define appearances from either the being inside, or from the beingness outside - have provided a source of some of the most rich and persistent metaphors for Western culture. With the 20th century bringing a re-emergence of the idea of the skin as an organ rather than a boundary, notions and representations of the physical body dominated the work of last century and painting returned as an important medium for such depictions. This article looks at the metaphoric and literal relationship between skin and its various representations in contemporary art.

Pat Hoffie

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