Shannon Syme and Carlo Pagoda - SOL Gallery
Shannon Syme’s installation draws you in through SOL Gallery’s window, promising warmth as a reprieve from the cold. Taking up the first room of SOL Gallery’s to-hire space, Syme uses drawing and installation to explore her relationship with the world that surrounds her. At the back in the second space is Carlo Pagoda’s Circo Cristiano exhibition which conflates the magic of the circus with the mystic nature of Catholicism. These are two solo shows with little in common with each other except sharing the gallery, which isn’t a bad thing!! I really enjoyed the contrast of the overwhelming installation in Syme’s rooms and the reverent refined work of Pagoda’s in the back.
Firstly, Shannon Syme. Seemingly expanding off the page, Syme’s drawings are situated amongst an installation that isn’t bound by any constraints. Objects hang in the space, dripping from the walls, dangling from the ceiling, spilling from the window sills. At first glance, you can’t tell what anything is made from – it truly feels like ‘drawing in space’. An explosion of mark making made 3D, that interacts with not only its surroundings but its viewers as well. Such as sculptural folded paper hanging on tentative wires, spinning in the air as gallery visitors move around them. I am so intrigued by the embroidery work also featured as pieces of the installation. Small, beaded elements and collaged textiles sitting on seemingly scrap pieces of fabric, which curl up and form to things added to it. Reminiscent of petri dishes, these feel like living things almost growing and evolving on their own. This is reflected in the drawings themselves. The marks are obviously thoughtful but frantic, looping onto themselves, these drawings are layered, colourful, energetic and pulsating like they’re living things. Even the titles of the drawings feel like interactions with the installation that surround them; Anatomy Redux (2022), Bricolage (Topology) (2024), Archipelago Hopscotch (2024).
I’ve been following Syme’s tattoo practice on Instagram as @studio_gobbling for a little while now. They use skin as a canvas to hold the same mark making we see in the gallery. In some ways I feel like these drawings work even better on skin, for the way they almost act as installations on the body, that then work with the body - wrapping limbs, stretching and folding as the skin wearing them moves. (I will most definitely be getting a tat from them sometime soon, especially after seeing the work in person in this exhibition)
Past Syme’s explosion in the front of the gallery we see Carlo Pagoda’s Circo Cristiano in the second room. In this body of work Pagoda draws parallels between the magic of circus performers, side show acts, magicians and illusionists, and the mystical powers seen in catholic saints. These are conflated and painted onto banners like we would’ve seen at the circuses of old. We ‘behold the courageous Capt. Dan’El as he tames the most savage wild beasts on earth’ with the power of a cross held in hand and the divine light of God shining on him. Or, my personal favourite, a nun exposed under her habit to reveal a fully tattooed body in Passion Stigmata. These larger than life banners capture the wonder of interacting with something we don’t quite understand, something we would never be able to do ourselves or have only heard in stories.
The way the religious iconography has been inserted into the circus banners is flipped when we see the cross then infused with that same magic. Again, I love work that we can interact with and The King’s Cross, 6 sees square sequins shimmer and shake as we cheekily blow on it or move past it, and The King’s Cross, 11 is peppered with pinwheels, also able to spin, evoking that childhood wonder and whimsey of play. This is an excellent body of work from Pagano and I hope any buyers get multiple, because I think taken out of context of this collection individual works might lose some of that magic.
Shannon Syme and Carlo Pagoda solo shows remain at SOL Gallery in Fitzroy until June 15th.
