Paper and Clay

'Paper & Clay' brings together the work of twenty-nine Australian artists traversing the timeless materiality of two enduring artforms. Unencumbered by dense conceptual wilderness, the works in this show posit medium as both object and subject in a shared celebration of physical form.

Paper, like clay, has a history of being simultaneously utilitarian and aesthetic. For millennia it has played a pivotal role in written and visual culture, the everyday-ness of its origins mingling with the elevation of art in ways that carve open a valuable entry point for the viewer. Together, the painters in this presentation show us the different ways paper holds pigment - absorbing ink into its porous skin in an osmotic embrace, or propping paint atop its surface like a veil. Areas of paper are exposed in some works and obscured in others, taking us on a pendulum swing between revelation and concealment. (Arthouse Gallery)