sarah-jane mcgrath :: obsolete
1 Dec - 31 Dec 2017
Gallery 5
I elect to work with discarded materials of multiplicity, such as car exhausts, exhibiting subtle stages of decomposition through weathering, reflecting the subjective nature of waste and obsolete materials. I refer to this as ‘obsoletia’.
I find this form an alluring dialogue, in what may be referred to as the ‘future fossil index’. Where in time, layers of waste will be created and the period of our rampant consumerism will expose the future layers of fossilised material.
As the mushrooms (mycelium) flourish in this environment—weaving structural threads to form a new colony—exposing life and ancestral species, the evolutionary process, verses human destruction of old growth, is one of the pressing questions of our time. My art practice is based on these questions and conflicts.
As I sit in constant conflict with the law of natural selection and the survival of the fittest, the ‘obsoletia’ grows.
Artist Statement, sarah-jane mcgrath 2017
human extinction
consumer silence
mycelium grows
The colony play and feed between the scourge of collapsed consumerism and the simplicity of natures decay.
The ‘obsoletiacene’ is here.
Haiku, sarah-jane mcgrath 2017
There is a crack, a crack in everything,
That’s how the light gets in.
Leonard Cohen 1992, Anthem
Sarah-Jane McGrath was granted this exhibition as the winner of the 2016 Lismore Regional Gallery Graduate Award. The prize is presented annually to a student graduating from Bachelor of Visual Arts at Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW. Sarah-Jane is currently at Bachelor of Arts Honours at Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW.
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