JOSHUA PETHERICK: archive

Gertrude Contemporary, 2011

Cut-Offs, 2011

Saratogian Bedding, Croy Nielsen, Berlin

Images courtesy of Croy Nielsen, Berlin
Photo: Linda Fuchs

Simultaneous Solitudes

Images courtesy of Anna Schwartz Gallery.

Breaking Through The Mist video still

Breaking Through The Mist, 2011
looped digital Animation with audio (parabolic microphone recording), 2 synced portable DVD players

More to come.

Untitled Magazine Paintings, UQ Art Museum

Untitled Magazine Paintings, 2011
Joshua Petherick and Christopher L.G. Hill
University of Queensland Art Museum.

Install photos courtesy of Christopher.

Three's Company

Joshua Petherick
Waterproofing, 2010
Ink on trace paper

Joshua Petherick
Brothers (detail from series), 2010
Cast glass resin, paint, toner powder

Joshua Petherick
Brothers (detail from series), 2010
Brother cartridge laser drum, cast glass resin, paint, toner powder

Joshua Petherick
Waterproofing (detail), 2010
Ink on trace paper

Joshua Petherick
Brothers, 2010
Brother cartridge laser drum, cast glass resin, paint, toner powder

Three’s Company
Gambia Castle, Auckland
November – December, 2010

Hotel Theory

Joshua Petherick
High Orders of Mixed Business, 2010
A late encyclopedia, a glass of bad rum, a glass of river water (Yarra), glass and resin serving tray.

Arrangements, 2010
w. Liv Barrett

Untitled books, Nomabbamon

Yummy Fantasy

Yummy Fantasy
(a brief survey on some ideas behind Melbourne sculpture right now)
Curated by Kate Smith and Alex Vivian.
Studio 17, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne, 2010

Joshua Petherick
Storage, 2010
Cork and wood artist shelves with Polo towel, ink, paper, acetate, and tonefill film vacuumed-packed on primed canvas.

Joshua Petherick
Storage, 2010
Polo towel, ink, paper, acetate, and tonefill film vacuumed-packed on primed canvas.

Public Lounge

Public Lounge
Shepparton Art Gallery, Victoria
August – September, 2010

Featuring a series of portraits from the collection, a reading room containing a selection of the gallery’s research library of art books, journals and catalogues, and a selection of artworks to compliment the act of reading, Public Lounge will become a place of looking, reading and relaxing. The exhibition combines works from the Shepparton Art Gallery collection with selected loans and new works by contemporary artists.

Artists: Gracius Broinowski, Noel Counihan, Alice Currie, Ivan Durrant, Anne Graham, Matt Hinkley, John Longstaff, Bea Maddock, Dermont Hellier, Arnold Shore, Jessie Traill, Leonard French, Tom Nicholson, Hugh Ramsay, Kylie Stillman, Liv Barrett, Joshua Petherick, James Deutsher, Christopher LG Hill, among others.

Curated by Danny Lacy.

Joshua Petherick and Liv Barrett
Handmade Linen Highland Species, 2010
(from ongoing Arrangements series)
Flora arrangement from mobile phone jpg and Dulux swatches in ceramic vase with Dermont Hellier and Arnold Shore still-life paintings from the collection.

Assorted publications including collaborative books by Joshua Petherick and Christopher LG Hill, Tom Nicholson with Brad Haylock, and Matt Hinkley.

Sir John Longstaff
Portrait of Miss Ethel Grey, 1898
Oil on canvas.

Hugh Ramsey, Head of an Old Man, c.1900, Oil oncanvas; James Quinn, Muriel, purchased 1941, Oil on canvas; …

Lower Gallery:

Liv Barrett and Joshua Petherick were invited to extend their Arrangements project into an exhibition of the gallery’s hostings of decorative ceramics in the lower gallery, working with the collection of wall flower vases.

Liv Barrett and Joshua Petherick, 2010
Various ceramics.

Collaborative books by Joshua Petherick and Christopher LG Hill, 2009-ongoing.

Mundus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur

Tate Modern, London

No Soul For Sale
TATE Modern, London, 2010

Untitled books, Nom Abbamon

BOOTLEG AT THE MANOR

Joshua Petherick
Bootleg at The Manor, Y3K Gallery
December 12 2009 – January 9 2010.

Installation view.
Cork roll with production cuttings throughout the room.

Installation view.

Untitled, 2009
Graphite drawing, photocopy and found paper work, assorted squashed coins, and polypropylene hessian pressed in artist made frame (wood, plexiglass and plastic coated metal clips), shelf.
59.4 × 116 × 15.5 cm.

Untitled, 2009
Graphite drawing, photocopy and found paper work, assorted squashed coins, and polypropylene hessian pressed in artist made frame (wood, plexiglass and plastic coated metal clips), shelf.
84 × 91.4 × 15.5 cm.

Untitled, 2009
Graphite drawing, photocopy, assorted squashed coins, and polypropylene hessian pressed in artist made frame (wood, plexiglass and plastic coated metal clips), shelf.
59.4 × 116 × 15.5 cm.

detail.

Installation view.

Installation view with Water Drops on Burning Discs (floor), 2009
C-Print of water on CD-R photograph, assorted squashed coins, and polypropylene hessian pressed in artist made frame (wood, plexiglass and plastic coated metal clips), shelf (wall).

Water Drops on Burning Discs detail.

Installation view.

Bootleg at The Manor, 2009
Copy of Mike Oldfield’s Hergest Ridge LP depicting portrait of Sir Richard Branson’s Irish Wolfhound “Bootleg” taken in 1972-73 on the lawns of The Manor (the Virgin Records studios at Manor House in the village of Shipton-on-Cherwell in Oxfordshire, England), page from Richard Branson’s Screw It, Let’s Do It : Lessons In Life book, photocopy detailing the Virgin Record Store bootleg bust in 1973, metal push pins, gold book stand, cork and wood plinth.
44 × 40 × 31.5 cm.

Installation view.

Auras, 2009
Book with found colour-coded fashion spread magazine clippings fed into corresponding Aura colour definition pages, metal push pins, sunglass lenses, counterfeit Ralph Lauren “Polo Bear” towel, cork and wood plinth.
30 × 56 × 77 cm.

Detail of Auras.

Installation view.

Low Performance (production shelf), 2009
Ed. of 20 artists’ double C60 cassette release (Mouving/Mofarfarrah) in cases with unique booklet, aggregate concrete, SQMY batteries, cork and wood shelf.
121 × 16.3 × 25.5 cm.

Detail.

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Photocopy detail.

Promotional material for The Manor Studios.

Close Shave, circa 1971.

Y3K Gallery

Nom Abbamon

NOM ABBAMON
Joshua Petherick
Christopher LG Hill
March 13 – April 3, 2010
Y3K Gallery, Melbourne

desk text

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Catalogue texts:

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Turning Siamese

Somewhere in the book of Genesis appear the Nephilim’s, a race of people formed by fallen angels and humans. When I was younger, and took most things as fact, I wondered how this would work- less so the mechanics of the making, but mainly about the final product. If a body were part angel where would one begin and end? What would it be to lie somewhere between the opaque and the sheer? I thought of people with fuzzy edges that glowed with a strange holy light, had super powers, and dressed like Vikings.

Johnny Weir is a figure skater, whose costume for his long program Fallen Angel is a delicate white bodice decorated with a feathered wing outlined in swarovski crystals. In it he becomes part air, part earth. His hands in little white gloves fade away, become almost one with the frictionless surface of the ice. His black velveteen legs strike out across the surface of the ice, incise it and carve it up. One gets the sense of a simultaneous fading and colouring, of a chimera formed between the present moment and endlessness, of a Nephilim of weight and weightlessness.

Petroushka from the ballet of the same name is a puppet brought to life by his captors flute. When he is murdered he becomes a ghost who’s human wailing defies his carcass of wood and straw. In his role as the poorly treated puppet, Nijinsky wore large black gloves. His clown make-up, white and thick stood out against the dark scenery, while his gloved hands melted into it. Stills from the ballet leave one with the impression that his body is beginning to dissolve, to soak up his surroundings like ink. Through a simple pair of gloves Nijinsky created a character melting at the edges, slowly burning up like incense, or a lit cigarette.

Classical ballet hands extend like arrows through space, hinting at an eternal line that moves onwards, past the dancers body. Nijinsky adopted a more relaxed way of holding his hands. The effect appears as one not moving through, but briefly resting in the now. His hands droop, hang, fall, rest- like a tree about to shed it’s leaves, a flower about to loose it’s bloom. As the Spirit of the Rose he becomes rooted to the earth, caught in the rhythmical cycle of seasons. There is a sense of his body losing its edges and melting into the present moment.

One of the most well loved portraits taken of the great ballerina Anna Pavlova is a photograph of her in the garden cradling a pet swan. The bird’s long neck drapes around Pavlova’s shoulder, and both gaze off in the same direction. Entwined and peaceful, they become a singular movement. There are also portraits of Pavlova with dogs, birds, a camel, an elephant and her Siamese cat. In these portraits she seems to unconsciously mimic the animal she is with. Whether it is a feline pose on a window seat, or a hand clenched like a paw, one gets the feeling of an acute sensitivity to the present moment, a melting into ones surroundings. It depicts a freedom not of the separate, but the communal.

I am always forgetting about the present moment, always forgetting that all I am and have, is here in the now. And when I do remember, when I do stop, I feel a relaxing in my body and I feel endless and at peace. There is no Balinese word for ‘art’ or ‘artist’. It is a sentiment, unbordered by words, indefinite and undefined. As a feeling it melts into all corners of life and in doing so inhabits everything. If I could describe how I would want to live it would be similar to this. It would be to fade into the moment, and in doing so colour it, like a burst pen in a shirt pocket.

Sriwhana Spong

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GOLDEN BREED AND THE DAWN PROCESS (ode to Albert J. Whitlock)
S. M. Taylor – March 2010

The night is darkest before the dawn, and at that exact moment, a suburban teenager lies asleep in his bed beneath a large blue and green poster. Prefiguring the rising sun, the poster is a vision of a cliff sheltered sandy beach strewn about with large egg shaped orbs. In the foreground one of the orbs has broken open and a large triangular point is breaking the shell’s surface. Scatterred across the beach long haired figures are descending the gentle slope carrying these strange shapes towards the beckoning surf of the ocean. The whole scene is backlit by a giant yellowing sun. The teenager rolls to his side murmuring, in his mind a conversation is taking place with a small dark haired girl, she is standing on a rocky path reaching out towards a low hanging branch, and asking him …

“What do you want to be?”

The Dawn Process is created by first mounting a piece of glass in front of a film camera. Through the glass there are three figures standing in a green grassy field. On the field is a long strip of man made snow. The three figures stand side by side, gazing into the distance, one is bearded and wearing a sombrero, the other is carrying a rope and the third is the oldest and stands with solemn eyes. Black paint has been applied to the glass so that it frames only the strip of snow. Filming begins and the figures begin stomping across the field of view …

Harsh and grey. Getting very dark as winter takes a stronger hold. The mountainous and snow ridden country side remains bare and white apart from sheer rock faces and pinnacles and a cluster of manmade constructions. Three men are walking out in the open and heading towards the low group of shelters.

A storage facility lies on the northern most corner of the compound. Hidden among the archaic remains of lab equipment, rotting table tennis bats, and discarded clothes from long gone visitors are the filling cabinets of maps and surveys of areas now well known. Among these is a tattered poster curled up and sealed in a cardboard tube. The tube has ◆◆◆◆◆ scrawled on the side in black permanent marker. It appears to have lain in the same position for many years.

In the main compound the interior is a cramped and never ending maze of hallways, passageways, and doors which connect the many rooms and compartments. Sturdy, but prefabricated materials have been used in it’s construction. The most spacious area of the building and the main centre of activity in the compound – is the REC Room.

Far away from the others, ◆◆◆◆◆ is sitting in front of a small electric stove with a single element glowing orange in circular radiance. Next to him propped on a wooden table is a teapot with steam rising from the open mouth. There is an open, but yellowed newspaper nearby and Hawaiian music is playing from a tape deck. Several people across the room are crowding together around a single television. ◆◆◆◆◆ is staring intently into the hypnotic concentric glow on top of the stove. Slowly he reaches out with his fingers and lightly touches the edge of the element. His finger sticks momentarily to it before he peels it away. He can feel no heat and there is no pain. Intrigued, he begins touching the element for a longer period each time, he really loves the way his skin feels as it peels off the metallic edge. Lifting his hand to his eyes and staring at the tips of his fingers he is surprised by the fusing of the fingerprint ridges and the rising and bubbling of the surface of his skin. A landscape is forming. In his eyes it is like the beginning of the earth and all he can do is stare in wonder.

Cold water.

Searing pain.

His eyes stunned and out of focus.

A small dark haired woman is holding his hands steadily under a stream of water issuing from the sink. Her eyes are deep and calm. Her face drifts in expressions as though made up of three or more layers. Each layer has the smoothest skin and is thoughtful and blinking. She is saying something to him …

“Where are you?”

“Hello, are you there? Can you hear us? Excellent well go ahead …”

“Is dopamine kind of like a filtering function?

“Well, yes, certainly. It, it’s like a filtering function. That’s a very good way of conceptualizing it.”

“Because without that there’d be just chaos with all these stimuli coming in. Is that right?”

“Yes. That’s right. I think dopamine is one of the things that allows us to select targeted information from a noisy background …”

She has seated him at the table. His hand is bandaged and his fingers are pulsing and feel swollen. A cup of tea is placed in front of him. The newspaper is open and he starts to read …

During this period you will try to achieve something of significance in your work or career. You will not find it sufficient to continue as you have, and your ambition will become more powerful than usual. This can be either good or bad in the long run, depending upon how you go about getting ahead. On the positive side, this influence helps you overcome your previous limitations, which were caused largely by fear and lack of confidence. Now you feel capable of greater achievements and willing to work for them. This influence usually creates great optimism and self-confidence, but you must be careful that it does not become overconfidence. Your life will not take care of itself if you neglect the important details of daily existence. Do not let your seemingly more important present concerns cause you to neglect these other aspects of your life.

But this influence can also signify an inflated ego, a state of mind in which you attribute to yourself powers and talents far beyond your actual abilities. In rare and extreme cases, a person may think of himself as godlike. But for most people this is expressed simply as overestimation of one’s talents. Be careful not to take on more than you can handle. There is so much positive energy in this influence that it would be unfortunate to waste it with pride, foolish arrogance and overestimation of your capabilities.

A pensive ◆◆◆◆◆ is now hunched over a plate of glass. It is a painting of the Arrakeen Valley. The tips of his fingers are trembling and he knows it is all over. He himself gave us the best capsule description of a matte shot in a 1974 Herald Examiner interview: “In simple terms, a matte shot is a need for an image that doesn’t exist. It doesn’t exist because either it’s too expensive to go shoot it, or it’s too expensive to manufacture by other means. What you do in effect is block out an area of a scene into which you put a painting.” This was a great man. Now, he is old and frail. Shaking and tremors travel along his ageing body, the mind flickers and switches, words form and disappear. Near the end, as in the beginning, he was lying in his bed. In the last moments, with his eyes closed, he was heard to mutter something by his youngest dark-haired daughter ..

“You know I go to bed thinking about it, uh, thinking about schemes and, and conjuring up images of, uh, hitting a jackpot and exactly what I’m going to do with it and how I’m going to spend it and how delighted everybody is going to be with me when I came home with all the uh … all the uh … big bucks!”

A pause was in her eyes as she travelled from man to no-man.

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ACCA at Mirka Tolarno, Melbourne

Joshua Petherick
ACCA (Australian Centre for Contemporary Art)
at Mirka Tolarno, Melbourne, 2010

Photos: John Brash

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Joshua Petherick has created a body of work that throws objects and images into orbit around the position Mundus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur – translated from Latin to mean ‘The world wants to be deceived, so let it be deceived.’

Petherick pulls together a selection of falsities and conceited performances (like a simple magic trick expressed with a silver coin or a glass), and in relation to each other these scenes form an exposition of the substantial human tendency to engage with reality in disguise. Imagery of white magicians’ gloves, upturned drinking glasses and liquefied coins all refer to a human culture of willing self-deception. The collaged material is framed in wooden wine display boxes, a place usually reserved for one of the world’s greatest social lubricants and fertilisers of narrative – alcohol. Petherick conjures references to the surrounding context of Mirka, including in the work a subtle conversation about the bond between aesthetic pleasure, amoral judgements and taste.

Mundus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur is a dictum credited to the Roman courtier and author Petronius, who lived during the reign of Nero and was described by his contemporaries as an elegantiae arbiter, or an arbiter of taste. He was devoted to sensory impulse and, according to Tacitus, finely skilled in the ‘science of luxury living.’ Petherick discovered Petronius’ short text about deception on a coin held in a collection, coalescing some ongoing interests of the artists, including the use of coins as an object with both determinate and indeterminate features, that attempt to establish meaning through design and repetition, and symbolic tokens of the instability and malleability of currency and value.

Joshua Petherick currently lives in Melbourne, working as an artist and textile designer. He recently opened World Food Books, a small retail space devoted to selected contemporary and limited edition publishing from America, Europe and Australasia.

Liv Barrett
curator and writer, ACCA

Cargo Project, Hyde Park Art Centre, Chicago

CROSS COLOURING

Untitled (Nu Theatre Of Bathos), 2009
Plastic bag, omnicrom film, plexiglass, cast iron.
56 × 42 cm.

Cross Colouring.
An international exchange between Joint Hassles and Gambia Castle.

Untitled

Untitled, 2009
Ink on canvas.
59.5 × 84.2 cm (ea.)

Untitled, 2009
Ink on canvas.
42.2 × 59.5 cm

Untitled, 2009
Ink on canvas.
59.5 × 84.2 cm

Units In Glissando

Units In Glissando, 2009
Pine shelving system, two one hour audio loops, mp3 players, headphones, Glisser video loop, monitor, DVD player, framed Celestial Din production still C-prints, books, mixed-media artist made publications (collaboration with Christopher LG Hill), marble, bubble wrap, Nu Theatre Of Bathos publicity poster, hanging marks and screws in wall, printed napkin.
Dimensions variable.

Installation details, Artspace, Auckland.

Artspace

Newcall

Why Freak? Mmm' Kay...

Y3K Gallery

AURAS

From the Auras group of works, 2009
Framed C-Prints.
84.1 × 59.4 cm each.

Secret Life

Fragment for Ola Vasiljeva’s Secret Life project. 2009.
1 channel video with sound

NEON PARC

Neon Parc, Melbourne, 2009.
Two person show with Nick Austin.

Publick Displays.

Are You Being Duplicated?, 2009
Digital C-prints on archival paper from two collages.
104.5 × 67.5 cm each.

Publick Display (Sir Jacob), 2009
Stainless steel, plexiglass, tone-fill, graphite and ink on paper, tissue paper, acetate sheets, office binder, oil.
Dimensions variable.

“Publick Display (Sir Jacob)” detail.

Installation detail.

Rock In Opposition, 2009
Graphite on paper, acetate, tissue paper, plexiglass.
56 × 42 cm.

Installation detail.

Installation view.

Exercises, 2009
Abridged artist re-production of Raymond Queneau’s 1947 book Exercises In Style, set to 180 pages of transparent film, plexiglass, pine.
3 × 20 × 25.5 cm.

WISH YOU WERE HERE (SLOWLY)