Gallery installation view, 2010


UNDERGROUND

Imagine a space where the light can’t get in. Underground: a mysterious sanctuary, abundant with oozing leaks and paranormal breezes. Thoughts of inhabiting such a place were the motive for making this suite of paintings.

In her book The Coherence of Gothic Conventions 1, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick claims the term ‘live burial’ acts not only as a punishment popular in Gothic novels but also as a structural name for the Gothic salience of ‘within’. With this in mind, these paintings reflect an underground site, considered both refuge and prison, paralleling an internal psychological mindscape.

Visually, the work suggests a fragmented psychological horror movie, while romancing the intimate nature of seventeenth century Dutch Still-life. These paintings are made using restrained traditional colours composed of pigments and minerals drawn from the earth. They are an inquiring conflation of process, ideas and image, occupying an uneasy space between anecdote and the abstract.

Mary-JeanRichardson
May 2010

left: Underground 3, 2010, oil on board, 23 x 18cm
right: Underground 2, 2010, oil on board, 18 x 23cm




left: Underground 5, 2010, oil on board, 18 x 23cm
right: Underground 4, 2010, oil on board, 23 x 18cm





left: Underground 8, 2010, oil on board, 23 x 18cm
right: Underground 6, 2010, oil on board, 18 x 23cm



MARY-JEAN RICHARDSON
Curriculum Vitae

Biography

1964     
Born

2000     
Bachelor of Visual Art (Hons), Adelaide Central School of Art

2001-2004     
Co-founding member, Twinbee Studios

2004     
Co-founding member, Hedgemaze Studios

2007-2009     
Lecturer, SA School of Art, University of South Australia

2008-2010     
Masters by Research, SA School of Art, University of South Australia

2001-present    
Lecturer, Adelaide Central School of Art
Currently lives and works in Adelaide, South Australia

Solo exhibitions (since 2002)

2010     
Underground, Greenaway Art Gallery, Adelaide

2008     
Parkland, Johnston Gallery, Perth
New Paintings, SoMA Gallery, Adelaide

2006     
Frontier drifters, Johnston Gallery, Perth

2005     
Crush Me, Central Gallery, Adelaide

2002     
Familiar, Studio 91b, Adelaide

Selected group exhibitions (since 2003)

2010     
Let me in, Format Festival, Adelaide
Heartlines, Fenn Place: 24 hr installation, South Australian School of Art
Hedgemaze, Prospect Gallery, Adelaide Fringe Festival

2009     
Critical Generosity, Feltspace, Adelaide

2008     
Strange Attractors, Liverpool St Gallery, University of South Australia

2007     
Arts SA Curatorial program 2007-8
Shades of the Real, Central Gallery, Adelaide
True Portraits, Central Gallery, Adelaide
Hedgemaze, Light Square Gallery, Adelaide
Intent, Queens Theatre Adelaide, Adelaide

2006     
Kerdumba Drawing Award, Wentworth Falls, NSW
Ideal Worlds, Gaf Gallery, Port Adelaide

2005     
Luminous 2, Helen Gory Gallery, Melbourne
Represented Artists, Johnston Gallery, Perth

2004     
Drawing Today, SALA/Country Arts SA Touring Exhibition
Pucker, The Institute, Port Adelaide, Adelaide Fringe Festival

2003     
Eleven, SALA Festival, Cube Contemporary Art, Adelaide
Hatched, Perth Institute of Contemporary Art, Perth
HEAT, Noosa Regional Gallery, QLD
Adelaide Contemporary, Eva Breuer Gallery, Sydney

Collections

Artbank, Sydney
St Peters College, Adelaide
Wilderness School, Adelaide