Silently, childhood’s crystalline paths sank in the garden - Oddaný Gallery
I often find that curator’s texts which accompany exhibitions leave me more confused after reading them. Instead of making the vision clearer, I’m usually left with the feeling that the curator wants me to think they’re smarter than me, and that they see something in the work that I don’t. Maybe in part that’s my own insecurity about not “getting it” coming through, but also in part I think it’s a hatred for the over intellectualisation of art and the aptly named “art wank” of it all. BUT!!! Ava Leach-Absalom and Mia Lewin manage to avoid this and instead leave me with a piece of writing that truly pulls this show together — a text that “evokes a world of memory not as a linear archive but a flickering presence”. And! their writing mirrors George Trackl’s poem from which they’ve drawn their inspiration and title of the show! George Trakl’s Memory (fragment); Silently, childhood’s crystalline paths sank in the garden. Memories and remnants of the past are threads that draw this exhibition at Oddaný Gallery together, as well as an aesthetic sensibility full of soft neutrals contrasting an industrial feeling.
Silently the child dwelled in nocturnal cave listening in the blue wave of the spring to the ringing of a radiant flower. And the pale figure of the mother stepped out of the decayed wall and sleepwalking she carried the sorrow-born in slumbering hands into the garden. And the stars were drops of blood shimmering in the bleak branches of the old tree and they fell in the nocturnal ones hairy hair, and the boy quietly lifted the purple eyelids, the silver forehead sighing in the night wind.
Wakening in the evening garden in the quiet shadow of the father, o how frightens this radiant head suffering in blue coolness and the silence in autumnal rooms. A golden boat the sun sank at the lonely hill and the serious treetops fall mute overhead. Silently the slumbering countenance of the sister encounters in moist blueness, buried in her scarlet-colored hair. Blackish the night followed the other one.
What forces to stand so silently on the decayed spiral staircase in the house of the fathers and the flickering candlestick expires in lank hands. Hour of lonely sinisterness, mute awakening in the hallway in the sallow web of the moon. O the smile of evil sad and cold, so that the sleeping woman's rosy cheek pales. In showers a black linen veiled the window. And a flame jumped out of the other one's heart and it burned silverly in darkness, a singing star. Silently childhood's crystalline paths sank in the garden.
- George Trakl Memory (fragment)
The poem conjures hazy feelings of longing and nostalgia which are reflected perfectly in Tara Howe’s Orchid, which sees topaz and moonstone gemstones nestled amongst the erotic petals of the metal flower. The usually delicate and velvety petals of the bloom are made solid and unyielding when cast in sterling silver—it’s been said before and it’ll be said again, but there’s certainly something to be said for taking something ephemeral and making it eternal. Taking a memory and treasuring it, holding it close, wearing it. It’s displayed paired with Horse which is more of a sturdy cowboy-esque bolo tie than its delicate necklace like Orchid counterpart - more wearable and almost more tangible in some kind of way.
Bridie Fitzgerald’s Untitled Collection captures a perception of persistently inconsistent memory with an assembly of silver gelatine prints onto hand coated photographic dry plates. The soft tenderness and vulnerability depicted in the prints are at total odds with the industrially aggressive wire hangings that clutch at the rectangles of glass. Steeped in a summer melancholy, these are the hero works of the show for me. Compelling and personal, they’re perfectly understated when hung against Oddaný’s half walls draped in their creased sheets. The gallery’s physical space truly harmonises with the work held within. Stark lighting, white painted brick, and drab office linoleum tiled floor are at odds against the softly draped curtains and the church pew full of burning thick candles that greets visitors at the entrance. This show introduces me to Oddaný excellently – the themes of the show feel like they reflect the gallery itself. Concerned with time and memory, imposingly industrial while at the same time being forgiving and indulgent. The gallery is in its new home on Sydney Road, Brunswick, having moved from the original space on Johnston St. It’s clear that it’s been a labour of love for those involved, in the true spirit of an ARI, and I can’t wait to see what Oddaný does next.
Silently is on until the 9th of May at Oddaný and also features work by Courtney Moore, Francesca Havelock, Gabriella Bartolo-Kanellopoulos, Marnie Florence-McNeil, Mia Lewin, Pearl Reilly-Murray, Phaedra and Sierra Vance.