The Paper Attic
A room full of painstakingly made paper replicas of junk call into question our ideas about use and value.
Overview
Benja Harney is a 'Paper Engineer'. This does not mean, as it might at first glance seem, that he is an engineer made out of paper, but that he does engineering with paper. Although maybe he could engineer paper into a paper engineer? In any case he hasn't done that this time; he's instead recreated a roomful of discarded objects upstairs at the appositely-named Object Gallery.
Harney's first solo show, The Paper Attic forms part of the Sydney Design 2011 program and reflects the intersection of art and design. He has worked across advertising, fashion, illustration and in making pop-up books alongside his fine art practice, and shows the precision of someone who has been doing this professionally for the last six years as well as the ingenuity of the self-taught artist/artisan.