Gerry Wedd: In the Woods

Gerry Wedd, In the Woods (installation detail), ceramic, 2010. Image courtesy of the artist. Gerry Wedd, In the Woods (installation detail), ceramic, 2010. Image courtesy of the artist.

Exhibitions
21 January – 5 March 2011
Gallery 3

Beauty and danger inhabit miniature world depicting Australian outback.

VIEW IMAGES

In the Woods takes its cue from the concept of the ‘Australian Gothic’, a construction of the Australian landscape as both a bountiful utopia and a hellish place where nature seems uncannily strange or hostile. Like most figurines, the work sets up a complex relationship between audience and object: on the one hand the viewer is drawn into the interior world of the miniature, on the other they are in control of a scenario where the figurines assume the characteristics of a toy.

Gerry Wedd is a renowned ceramicist based in Adelaide. Wedd’s practice comprises wheel thrown, slip and cobalt decorated ceramics as well as work of a more sculptural nature. From 1991-2006 he designed for Mambo Graphics and has worked in consultation with a number of community groups to produce public art works. Wedd has exhibited nationally and internationally and has work in many public collections.

This work is influenced by Staffordshire figurines, knick-knacks that were sold at fairs and often commemorated events such as famous murders. The miniature and the figurine both skirt the area of kitsch. This tableau operates as a kind of allegory, where the outback and its inhabitant creatures stand in for the ‘other’. Pop-cultural references such as the film ’Wake in Fright’ and the Triffid’s song ‘Lonely Stretch’ were uppermost in my mind whilst devising and making these pieces.  
Gerry Wedd.

Resources
Opening speech by Professor Ken Gelder, Lecturer Literary Studies and Cultural Studies, School of Culture and Communication, University of Melbourne.

Download pricelist here

Photography: Lily Feng

back to top