April 2021
AIRspace Projects, Marrickville

More Than Reproduction: Dimensions Variable

Bea Buckland-Willis, Sarah Catania, Jacqui Driver, and April Phillips

A tension - or rather a resistance - against merging with other artistic disciplines has perpetuated in printmaking culture, where a purist sensibility continues to reign. Pulling at this tether, Dimensions Variable, explores the materiality of contemporary printmaking, presenting works by artists Bea Buckland-Willis, Sarah Catania, Jacqui Driver, and April Phillips. Departing from convention, these artists navigate the shifting and expanding field of printmaking into a hybrid space; moving from static imagery to embodied forms by engaging with space and dimensionality, using unorthodox substrates, and stimulating interactivity. These transgressive outputs usurp traditionally accepted approaches to print-media, which prioritise works on paper and two-dimensionality with all formal attributions stemming from the printing process rather than post-production manipulation. For these artists, content and materials have become inseparable, with each work personifying traces of deeper associations and symbolism already embedded within their surfaces. The obligations of the ‘editioned print’ are removed, allowing for unique states and imperfect forms to be celebrated.

Something printmaking is rarely associated with is the activation or embodiment of space, a notion that is challenged as each work engages beyond the wall. Furthermore, these works foster an unfamiliar interactivity, opposing the convention of pristine paper that refuses contact. This new relational space is documented through alternate realities and temporalities - suspension, video, Augmented Reality, and tactility.

Navigating the juncture between traditional methodologies and formal innovations, Dimensions Variable explores the active disruption of the fundamental attributes of printmaking through installation, sculpture, and technological overlay. Tradition and innovation oppose, interact, and merge to present new ways of working with and understanding the potential of a resistant, yet increasingly malleable medium.