Artrave

Published December 1995

Wer ist Unschuldig?

This issue of Artlink meanders (with kitschy loucheness rather than formalist stringency) around 'taste' bad and good, the workings of taste and various permutations of cultural expression in present day Australia. Kitsch is scrutinised.

Published December 1995

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.

Published December 1995

Kitsch or Kind: Representations of Aborigines in Popular Art

Much contemporary Aboriginal art functions in the inappropriate melding of two visual art traditions and is kitsch within the given meaning within the article.

Published December 1995

Motor-Cross Dressing

Issues of stereo-typing, conforming behaviour and fun and practicality are looked at in an observation of an MG driver.

Published December 1995

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.

Published December 1995

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.

Published December 1995

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).

Published December 1995

Teaching Aids

Exhibition review Active Agents: Aids Art in Australia
Anthony Babicci, Bronwyn Bancroft, Simon Carver, Eddie Hackenberg, Ian Hartley, Leonore Lancaster, David McDiarmid, Ross Moore, Marcus O'Donnell, Scott Redford, Celia Roach, Gary Shinfield, Jackie Stockdale, Andrew Thomas-Clark, Hiram To, Julia Topliss, John Turner, David Urquart
Curators Jill Bennett and John Turner
University Gallery, University of Tasmania, Launceston
11 May - 9 June 1995

Published December 1995

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.

Published December 1995

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.

Published December 1995

Mary MacKillop Kitsch

I confess to a feeling of great affection for Mary MacKillop (1842 - 1909), vernacular culture and kitsch, and great enthusiasm for the idea of an Australian Vatican - an extravagant museum which is also a major site of pilgrimage.

Published December 1995