Bigs R Us

Australians have a natural thirst for objects of grand scale, however ridiculous their theme or location or context. From big sandfly, big axe to big oyster and beyond, we are the big desert island that experiences big wets and big dries, little wonder someone made a Big Tap to remind us...we are big drinkers.

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Inflecting the Museum

Exhibition review Litteraria Simryn Gill and Robert MacPherson Artists in residence at the South Australian Museum 16 September - 31 December 1995

Barry Craig

Bruising as R & D

Livid Festival was launched in Brisbane in 1988 with the broad altruistic aim of 'giving a go' to local Brisbane bands, performers and visual artists. Within three years the festival had grown exponentially and included a wide range of feature guest artists.

Pat Hoffie

Destiny Deacon: It's Been Ages Since We Last Marched

You can hear her on the radio and see her on the television and contemplate her in better State galleries. Pluralist par excellence, artist, writer and film-maker Destiny Deacon has been blazing away on visual and linguistic fronts since premiering 'Koori Rocks Gub Words' in 'Pitcha Mi Koori' (1990).

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Delma's Collection

Collections of any kind require patience, luck, money, space, time and dedication.....

Emma Hopton

Kitschoprenia

Our affection for kitsch is a benign form of aesthetic hypocrisy. My generation, give or take 15 years, adores kitsch. We want to have some badness; it's fun: you laugh both at your dismay for an object and your perplexity over the delight that it brings. In a broad cultural sense, my generation is kitschophilic; and this means, I suppose, not that we love the kitschy object with innocence but that we love the contempt which the kitschy object arouses.

Robert Nelson

Not Afraid of Flying: Fairies and Femocrats

Are gossamer wings set to supplant shoulder pads as signifiers of feminist power? Shopping malls in middle class suburbs are now sprouting fairy shops where, for only a few dollars, little girls and grown-up ones too, can sprout fairy wings that temporarily release them from the masculine world around them.

Anita Calloway

The Other Big F-Word

Monash University Gallery presented Fashion, Decor, Interiors, curated by Natalie King 7 June - 15 July 1995, high-lighting aspects of advertising, mass production and architectural design through the work of Lyndal Walker, Tony Clark and Stephen Bram -- extracts from the exhibition catalogue.

Juliette Peers

Kitschville - The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras

...But the Mardi Gras will always be a child of the seventies. Remember that mantra 'the personal is political'. In spite of the co-option and mainstreaming of Lesbian and Gay culture this wonderful spectacularly amateurish display (of difference) cannot help but be a politicised intervention.

Craig Judd

When Is A Door Not A Door?

Exhibition review Birds Have Fled Angela Valamanesh Univsersity of South Australia Art Museum 7 September - 2 October 1995

Stephanie Radok

Thought Police Versus Life: Extracts from an Interview with Ray Hughes

Discussion with the artist Ray Hughes about issues that have impacted on his art practice. Biographical details also included.

Tony Twigg

Made in WA: A Sculptor's Alternative Practice

Although well known in regional art histories, Western Australian sculptor Edward Kohler has a far wider importance. Economic survival led him to blend popular and high art long before it was standard practice. With the Piccadilly Theatre reliefs of 1938, the sheer exuberance and infectious quality of a positive (if unconscious) kitsch aesthetic entered professional Australian art 60 years ago: Hollywood meets Olympia.

Robyn Taylor

Pretty Baby

Collecting and making dolls grows in popularity in Australia, but members of Australia's arts industry are relatively under-represented in the ranks of doll collectors. Original dolls speak of the culture that produces them.

Juliette Peers

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