Wilderness

Overview

Let's begin by admitting that we, Australians, have a bit of a complex about being on the edge of things. Convicts, immigrants and the dispossessed, so far from the centre of the map that we could topple over the side at any moment. We're surrounded by strangely shaped trees bearing no resemblance to those that feature in the European canon, and the vast majority of our landscape is uninhabited, extreme and alien, even to us. That said, we also have a staunch pride in this difficult child that we are, the untamable underdog. Ned Kelly and all that. Something unpredictable and wild flows in our blood, or our adopted blood.

It is with this in mind that Wilderness, a collection of contemporary painting, is drawn together. Though all pieces explore this notion of the beyond, unity in diversity is the central rule. Fiona Fowry's airbrushed images impact from afar but recede into soft smudges as you approach, while Michael Zavros' tiny paintings indulge in minute elegance that demands study up close. In Del Kathryn Barton's largest work to date, almost invisible detail struggles against the overwhelming presence, colour and sexuality of the piece. Photorealism sits beside abstraction, black and white beside fluorescent colour. In unsettling and inspiring ways these oppositions blend into new breeds, where utopia and dystopia seamlessly feed into each other, and voids reveal untold worlds.

Images by Del Kathryn Barton We too have been there, though we shall land no more 2009 (detail); Louise Hearman Untitled #1304 2009, photography Mark Ashkanasy, courtesy of the artist and Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney.