ESCAPE ARTISTS EXHIBITION
APRIL - JUNE 2023, HAWKESBURY REGIONAL GALLERY, NSW
CAITLIN HEPWORTH & MARIAN SHAPIRO
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Exhibition Description
Escape Artists is a creative collaboration between contemporary mosaic artists Caitlin Hepworth and Marian Shapiro. They tell personal stories with universal relevance themed on Escape and Displacement, as well as extending the boundaries of and accessibility to mosaic art; an ancient artform with diverse contemporary application. Using the medium of contemporary mosaic they explore timeless themes by referencing physical and psychological states, covering distance and time from both personal and universal perspectives. Over the last three years. Marian and Caitlin have worked closely together exchanging ideas and processes producing a synergy which has resulted in a body of work comprising both individual and collaborative artworks where the whole is more than the sum of its parts. Caitlin’s body of work navigates the transition through psychological states towards emotional freedom. Stemming from personal and community experience of natural disaster, her work symbolises the ability of individuals and communities to transcend emotional, physical and psychological struggles. This investigation takes the form of hanging and freestanding sculptural mosaics which reference ancient female warrior forms and the freedom and transcendence evoked by birds in flight. Marian’s starting point is the conjunction of her personal family history and the current refugee crisis. In the early 1900s her great grandparents fled Lithuania with their young children. They were lucky and found asylum. Over a century later, the story continues. Many millions of people are currently in flight all over the world, in search of a better life. Marian’s response to this is to examine the journey of people from one life to another, escaping from the known, to the unknown. Visually, her point of departure is multi-faceted, inspired by old maps with their tears and discolourations, the maps at the back of in-flight magazines and the migration patterns of both birds and humans. |
Acknowledgements
With thanks to Curator Diana Robson and staff at Hawkesbury Regional Gallery.
Thanks to Michelena Bamford, David Fleming, David Lacey, Andrea Ketterling, Ernie Newman and Jim Stewart, Teagan Weaver and Linda Weiss for their assistance. |
'Allo'ed Ground: On the Cusp
Caitlin Hepworth
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The tail feathers of the bonded pair of South Eastern Glossy Black Cockatoos symbolise family. Geographically displaced or confined due to habitat loss from bush fire and urban expansion, the birds seek out their precious singular food source, the seed of the scarce Allocasurina tree.
Habitat reduction from bushfire, and forest clearance, has seen these magnificent birds classified as ‘vulnerable’, and on the cusp of ‘endangered’. They are forced to adapt, either confining themselves to smaller patches of food-rich forest, or feeding and nesting in less accessible, unsafe areas in order to survive leaving them prey to peril.
Seen here, rising together from the charred remains of home, the pair and their story become a metaphor for displaced families and individuals seeking new security and stability.
Habitat reduction from bushfire, and forest clearance, has seen these magnificent birds classified as ‘vulnerable’, and on the cusp of ‘endangered’. They are forced to adapt, either confining themselves to smaller patches of food-rich forest, or feeding and nesting in less accessible, unsafe areas in order to survive leaving them prey to peril.
Seen here, rising together from the charred remains of home, the pair and their story become a metaphor for displaced families and individuals seeking new security and stability.
Safety Net?
Caitlin Hepworth and Marian Shapiro
Safety Net? is a series of collaborative work made over the Covid19 pandemic and explores the ambiguity of safety. It examines juxtaposed and often simultaneous feelings of protection and entrapment, safety and claustrophobia, externally imposed isolation and self-imposed seclusion.
Being removed from community highlights our fundamental need for interpersonal connection. The subsequent re-emergence into, and navigation through, a changed world poses continued challenges.
Being removed from community highlights our fundamental need for interpersonal connection. The subsequent re-emergence into, and navigation through, a changed world poses continued challenges.
Series: Flight to Freedom
This series is a reinterpretation of the phrase ‘Fight, Flight or Freeze’, which is commonly used to describe instantaneous primal responses during an individual’s exposure to trauma.
But what takes place after that initial, adrenaline fuelled reaction? The layered and complex nature of being human in today’s global community, requires more than the ability to run, hide or fight. Escape or salvation and the journey towards healing is lengthy and complex, requiring endurance, acceptance and resilience.
Flight to Freedom extends and inverts these primal responses after the adrenaline is exhausted to map the journey towards healing. The flight is neither short nor linear, the winds are changeable, and the freedom is ultimately a state of mind.
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Safe Passage?
Caitlin Hepworth and Marian Shapiro
The narrative of Safe Passage? is ambiguous telling of the journey from danger to what? Of displacement from the known to the unknown, traversing perilous waters in the hope of a better life. Who is travelling on the ship as it makes its way through stormy seas? Where have they come from and where are they going? Will hope triumph over adversity?
Made as a collaboration, this work was co-designed and then had its own journey to fruition being passed from hand to hand and back again until it reached its artistic destination.
Made as a collaboration, this work was co-designed and then had its own journey to fruition being passed from hand to hand and back again until it reached its artistic destination.