What Gives
Exhibition dates: Wed 7 to Sat 24 April 2010
View the artworks
‘That photograph lined up all planets for this show. They all just quietly fell into place.’ -Stuart Spence speaking about ‘Pestilence, I Cast thee Out’, an image from his new exhibition ‘What Gives’.
‘Pestilence’ is a picture of an ominous floating pink curtain sweeping dismissively out from of an open apartment window into a dark sky, casting something unwanted into the ether.
Since his 2009 audio visual series, ‘As Yet Unclear’, (where well known Australian writers and musicians interpreted his photographs), Spence has been ‘chipping away at the new lump of rock, almost without knowing it.’
‘The process for shows is strange for me. I shoot without trying to think too much, just see a story, trust my instincts and fire away. I set nothing up. It’s only when I’m working on them afterwards that the themes start to emerge. Like some monster coming to life.’
‘What Gives’ opens April 6th at the Damien Minton Gallery. Among other moody images, the show is a collection of bewildered carnies, lost children, clinging lovers on scooters and wall flower cops.
These images ‘speak low and slowly of crucial moments’.
‘I’m very interested in that critical millisecond, where something could go either way. The weather, a family, a relationship. This is my only chance. They can be quiet or tumultuous times. Either way, something’s changing. Something is giving, and often something taking.
‘I wanted to really mess around with those words, ‘What Gives’. Play with the idea of not making it a question, necessarily, more a statement.’
In ‘This Is Not What You Want to Hear,’ a dimly lit fortune teller delivers her unwanted forecast with grim resolve. Is she getting a bad job done, or is she sadistically revelling in the dark disclosure?
Spence won’t be drawn into the nuts and bolts of his photographs, casting off the who/what/where questions with a shrug and a smirk that says, ‘C’mon, you tell me.’
Stuart Spence started out as a magazine photographer in Sydney in the 80’s and early 90’s, specialising in celebrity portraiture, principally shooting magazine features, record covers and advertising campaigns.
From 1986 till 1992 he produced an extensive black and white portrait exhibition called ‘Salute’, and in 1994 showed his colour portrait series ‘Lost In Face’.
From 2003-2007, Stuart devoted his time almost exclusively to fine art photography and the completion of ‘As Yet Unclear Pt 1.’, which showed at the Mary Place Gallery in Paddington, Sydney in 2007.
’As Yet Unclear Pt. 2’ (complete with artist interpretations) was shown at the Noosa Regional Gallery in Sept/Oct 2008 and the Damien Minton Gallery, Sydney as well as the MARS Gallery, Melbourne both in 2009.
In Melbourne, Stuart was commissioned to provide his images for the fit-out of a new concept apartment block called ‘Society’ in South Yarra.