CONNOR CHEN, EMILY GREENWOOD, RAYMOND HUYNH, IAI, LUKAS KALOS, MAËLYSE XINH LECULIER,
JINGRU MAI (MOIRA), KATE MCGUINNESS & ZÖE MARNI ROBERTSON
’OPTING OUT’
22 JULY – 23 AUGUST, 2024
PUBLIC PROGRAMS:
Thursday 1 August - Launch and Verge’s 15th Birthday Party
Wednesday 7 August - Artist Talks
Thursday 8 August - The Wage Debate | Verge X PULP
Opting Out, 2024. Photography by Jessica Maurer.
CURATORIAL STATEMENT
Functioning as a timestamp of student life in 2024, Opting Out takes a satirical, playful, and critical stance on labour and leisure, work and play. The exhibition looks at the concept of working to live, not living to work, and alternative ways to approach ‘the grind’ or systems that work against the individual.
Opting Out is a group show presented by students and recent graduates of Sydney College of the Arts, marking the 15th Anniversary of Verge. Artists in the show consider trends and anecdotal narratives around cost of living conversations such as ‘quiet quitting’, little treats’, capitalist critiques, eco-consciousness, and alternative spaces.
ARTIST STATEMENTS
MAËLYSE XINH LECULIER
WHAT I DID ON THE WEEKEND
Evolving 4-channel sound installation, looped (throughout gallery)
I've had this job for about 4 years, where I wear a black-buttoned up shirt, black pants and the closest thing to dress shoes that I own (I hope that no one notices the hole in the leather, or the white paint splattered on them), and I go to the event centre of a hotel or casino in Sydney. There, I set up a mini travelling exhibition of artworks by names anyone would know. Picasso, Dalí, Matisse, Chagall, Miro. Niche prints with dodgy looking certificates of authenticity on the backs of them. Nevertheless, they sell for thousands of dollars, to people in sequined ball gowns and tuxedos and shoes so polished I can see myself in their reflection. They bid silently, and sometimes loudly. Sometimes I get commission, sometimes I don't. I pack up when the auction ends, and I drive home. It's late, the windows are down and my music is playing.
BIO
Maëlyse is an artist living and working on stolen Gadigal land.
Left: Jingru Mai (Moira), Quiet Hot Springs, 2024, blown glass, dimensions variable.
Right: Connor Chen, Copium Machine, 2024, acrylic on canvas, steel piping, brackets, brass tap, bike wheel, wood frame and other found objects, 800 x 700 x 600mm.
Photography by Jessica Maurer.
CONNOR CHEN
COPIUM MACHINE, 2024
Contemporary cope and archaic labour. Wojak as a hieroglyph for the everyman, the condensed image and symbol for the self in reaction. Idea of Copium as a natural response to the capitalist slog. This image in its shitty ms paint mass reposted glory as an idol, an altar, next to a dumb machine. A “machine”. Something that moves. A wheel, the most basic form of a mechanism. Simple machine. The futility of labour in a capitalist structure. Futility of life itself. Humour. Satire. Whatever.
BIO
Connor Chen is a second year SCA student yelling at the universe. Navigating the cross sections of technology, the infinite world and the minute self. Chen is interested in the stupid machines that sing and the incorrigible human-ness that infects chunks of concrete. Connor Chen works across digital, video and sculptural mediums and he likes to paint as well.
EMILY GREENWOOD
TROLLEY HERDER, 2022 and TROLLEY HERDING, 2024
Left: Emily Greenwood, Trolley Herder, 2022, video documented performance work, 3.48 min.
Right: Emily Greenwood, Trolley Herding, 2024, video documented performance work, 4.34 min.
Photography by Jessica Maurer.
Emily Greenwood, Trolley, as part of Trolley Herding, 2024, approximately 960 x 1020 x 540mm. Photography by Jessica Maurer.
The performance explores the commodification of physical labour. The role of the trolley collector is a commodification of the mundane and tedious. Though without their work there would be no order in our society. The performance intends to lighten trolley herders' burdens and assist in maintaining order in our society.
Following on from concepts explored in Trolley Herder (2022), Trolley Herding recognises the gallery's role in performance work and the commodification of labour. Where Trolley Herder (2022) explores the commodification of the mundane and tedious, Trolley Herding investigates the commodification of labour solely for entertainment. Trolley Herding is a site specific work made for Verge's 15th Anniversary show.
Camera assistants:
Trolley Herder, 2022: Jasmine Greenwood and Ben Page
Trolley Herding, 2024: Ben Page
BIO
Emily Greenwood is a mixed- Tongan, multidisciplinary artist and underground writer living in Sydney. Their work explores themes involving body dysmorphia, intergenerational trauma, loss of culture, sexism, racism and classism. Recently they have begun to explore the intersection between Eurocentric and Pasifika art histories and theories through their practice of cultural appropriation and adaptation. Their most significant work to date is their self- written, produced and published intersectional feminist zine ‘GRRL ZINE’.
IAI
IAI, 2024, mixed media installation, dimensions variable. Photography by Jessica Maurer.
At the IAI, we are committed to pioneering new avenues for cultural expression across Sydney and internationally. Our mandate is to transform diverse urban landscapes into dynamic centers for contemporary art and cultural discourse. With a strategic focus on inclusivity and community engagement, IAI leverages partnerships with businesses, corporations, galleries, councils, governments, and universities to expand the reach and impact of our initiatives. By redefining traditional notions of exhibition spaces, we aim to democratise access to art and foster a vibrant, diverse cultural ecosystem.
BIO
The IAI is a new institutional initiative led by a board of members, with Xavier Valentino, an artist and recent Masters graduate from Sydney College of the Arts (SCA), serving as its primary spokesperson. The initiative focuses on creating new art institutional opportunities within and beyond Sydney’s urban metropolis. According to its guiding manifesto, the IAI views any existing location—whether public or private, internal or external—as a potential site for exhibitions and other contemporary cultural presentations. Unlike many established art institutions that rely on fixed locations and demographics, the IAI's audience is diverse and continually expanding. To date, the IAI has collaborated alongside the Woollahra Municipal Council, the NSW Government, the University of Sydney, and various businesses, companies, artist-run initiatives, and commercial galleries.
Lukas Kalos, Kirsova 4, 2024, Kenwood LS-P9200 stereo speakers, mixer, stereo receiver, 880 x 660 x 1190mm (each). Photography by Jessica Maurer.
LUKAS KALOS
KIRSOVA 4, 2024
A proposal for a playground on the site of the Minerva Theatre, the fourth of three existing playgrounds donated to the children of Sydney by Helene Kirsova, ‘The Godmother of Australian Ballet (and green spaces)’. A testament to her life’s tension between a rigour of elegance and the structures of play and beauty that supported it; Kirsova 4 manifests this. Reintroducing a life’s work manifested in the space she learned, performed, lived in and shared this through her performances and artistry, as the spaces she allowed generations to do the same. Resonating with the city and its inhabitants through play (and performance) are worked at in all ways; a learning that starts from a young age, but continues forever; standing structural, archival, emotional tests of time.
BIO
Lukas Kalos is an artist living and working in so called Sydney. He creates sculpture and installation dedicated to points of speculative collision, as an attempt to coalesce personal culture, history, and place.
JINGRU MAI (MOIRA)
QUIET HOT SPRINGS
Jingru Mai (Moira), Quiet Hot Springs, 2024, blown glass, dimensions variable.
The artist and the artist's girlfriend were both delighted after receiving the flowers in a moment of splendour, joy and serenity. For the artist, as a lesbian born in a place where homosexuality is not fully recognised in the cultural context, giving flowers to her girlfriend sometimes represents not only a sharing and transmission of emotions and joy, but also a subtle openness to the people around her: outside of work and study, we run our relationships the way we want to.
BIO
Jingru Mai (Moira) is a young Chinese female artist currently studying for her Honours Degree in Visual Arts at the University of Sydney, Australia. Her main mediums are glass and ceramics, but she does not exclude others, preferring to create colourful and poetic works. For her, the question of how to keep her work light, poetic and serious at the same time is an ongoing study, and she doesn't want it to seem too happy to the point of frivolity, or too serious to the point of pain, which is inextricably linked to her upbringing on the need for people to maintain a balance, whether as Asian, lesbian, or female.
Kate McGuinness, Terry at the Pub, 2024, two-channel video, 3.14 min / 3.12 min. Photography by Jessica Maurer.
KATE MCGUINNESS
TERRY AT THE PUB, 2024
It’s Wednesday the 5th of June and Terry is at the pub. The first match of Blues Vs Maroons is on tonight. Terry wears his Bunnies jersey underneath his NSW one. It’s my day off from slinging beers at the Shakespeare Hotel. Terry is the nicest man I’ve served. He gave me a $20 tip on Christmas Eve. The rich people that come in don’t give anyone a cent.
BIO
Kate McGuinness is a filmmaker and comic. With sensibilities of the flaneur, she develops an unusual affinity with the most unlikely of places, motorways, bus stops and pokie rooms. Intersecting video art and hybrid documentary her work creates an idiosyncratic camaraderie between viewer and subject matter.
ZÖE MARNI ROBERTSON
VIRTUAL MERITOCRACY: MIND OVER EVERYTHING THAT MATTERS, 2024
SERIES INCLUDES:
SATURN’S RETURN (BLOODTHIRSTY GERONTOCRACY), 2024-
BLUE ORIGIN/FEAST OF THE GODS, MMXXIII
CULTURAL CAPITAL/SUN KING (HIPSTER FASCISM), MMXXIII
PRONK: PRINT SCREEN (CAST-LIGHT HOROLOGY), MMXXIII
Left to right:
Zoë Marni Robertson, Blue Origin/Feast of the Gods, MMXXIII, from the series Virtual Meritocracy: Mind Over Everything That Matters, acrylic on (discarded) masonite, approximately 1200 x 1200mm.
Zoë Marni Robertson, Cultural Capital/Sun King (Hipster Fascism), MMXXIII, from the series Virtual Meritocracy: Mind Over Everything That Matters, acrylic on (discarded) masonite, approximately 1200 x 1200mm.
Kate McGuinness, Terry at the Pub, 2024, two-channel video, 3.14 min / 3.12 min.
Photography by Jessica Maurer.
Three tech barons changing the world to their own set of specifics. The tech multi-millionaire Bryan Johnson is spending $2 million a year attempting to live forever and has had blood transfusions from his son to do so. He characterises this as an experiment for the betterment of humanity while millions of children die unnecessarily. The version of humanity that survives is what is being contested, an “elite” of knowledge workers living ever longer while billions are never given the chance to prove their value even on these narrow terms. Meanwhile, Billionaire Jeff Bezos began by monopolising the retail of books, and now seeks to own the platform for all information through his efforts with Amazon Prime. His factories are famous for the immiseration of workers. He is painted here from a real picture where he is eating Iguana at an “explorers club” dinner. Peter Thiel is an occasionally a dissenting voice among the Tech Billionaire Class, especially regarding knowledge production. He provides grants with the stipulation that the recipient does not go to university. He was also, a primary donor to the Trump Campaign of 2016.
Zoë Marni Robertson, Pronk: Print Screen (Cast-Light Horology), MMXXIII, oil on (discarded) glass, approximately, 400 x 250mm. Photography by Jessica Maurer.
The countercultures that rose up in the 1960s and ‘70s, due in large part to protest movements concerning the Vietnam War, are widely understood to be progenitors of “Silicon Valley”. The efforts of concurrent movements such as the Black Panther Party, which focused on education and provision of food and resources to the oppressed, were slowly eroded by the Liberal Consensus. The evident hypocrisy is not historically new but part of a continuum of domination, especially on the part of white, Protestant men, assuming the position of enlightened saviours. It was the efforts of the Dutch East India company that first gave the world “Mare Liberum” or “The Freedom of the Seas”, a landmark document in the history of human rights that challenged the dominance of the Spanish and Portuguese in global trade. While the Dutch East India company were asserting universal human rights, they were creating their own monopolies and participating in the slave trade. The wealth created meant that the Dutch people could afford to buy art, resulting in what is referred to as “The Dutch Golden Age”, fantastically relatable to those of us whose wealth has been predicated on what amounts to slavery in the “global south”. The Silicon Valley elite would have us believe that their allegedly superior intellects should lead to this hierarchical society. From top to bottom it is a horror story.
BIO
Zoë Marni Robertson is an artist, writer and Sessional Academic currently undertaking a PhD at Sydney College of the Arts, living and working on the unceded land of the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. Zoë’s research-led artistic practice encompasses video, painting, prose, poetry and performance, often using found materials. Through her work, disparate research and personal connections are synthesised into a lived experience of the political. She has exhibited in the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney the Murray Art Museum (Albury), ARTSPACE Sydney and Tin Sheds Gallery; as well as producing frequent exhibitions through a vast network of Artist Run Initiatives.
RAYMOND HUYNH
OYSTER TRIPTYCH, 2024
Raymond Huynh and Sydney Rock Oysters, Oyster Triptych, 2024, ceramic and porcelain, handmade ceramic glazes composed of oyster shells, mother of pearl lustre, dimensions variable. Photography by Jessica Maurer.
Oysters are adaptive organisms, responding towards their environments, and entangling themselves within various complex systems. Ecologists have labelled them as being a ‘keystone species’, or an organism that will ‘hold’ an ecosystem together; Suggesting their perceived importance, as they act as filter feeders, habitats, or shelters for various marine and brackish environments.
Growing concentrically through their shells, they suggest notions of time or memory, through their prominent growth ‘rings’ that narrate their life, and experiences, as they ‘make with’ their complex environments. Through Oyster Triptych, I seek to engage with Beth Dempster’s idea of ‘sympoiesis’, or an ecological perspective of ‘making with’ others regarding planetary life; and rejecting or ‘opting out’ of notions of ‘autopoiesis’, or the concept of things being self-generating, or working strictly in an isolated system in terms of ecological systems, or artmaking practices for this artwork. This is conveyed through sculptural representations of oysters in the creation of this artwork, to reflect upon their vital roles and entanglements within various ecosystems, whilst seeking to utilise the remains of the organism (oyster shells), to impart their materiality and spirit, to give voice to the ‘other’ or non-human. ‘Opting out’ or questioning the Anthropocene’s perceived sense of superiority and hierarchy established through scientific nomenclature/classifications of the world, for an artwork that seeks a sense of kinship, collaboration or becoming/making with these organisms, as the transfer of energy or matter is passed on from one state to another in this collaborative work.
These ideas are conveyed through the incorporation of oyster shells in the chemical composition of a few ceramic glazes applied and incorporated on/within the work. Entwining material, form, and matter, and imparting a sense of liveliness towards the work, as traditional notions of a self-generating/isolated system for artmaking practices are ‘opted out’ for a collaborative work, in which the organism is given agency and autonomy to dictate and determine their representation, and skin through the surface treatment/outcome of the glaze results. Likewise, the use of mother of pearl lustre, or an overglaze composed of nacre derived from molluscs, seeks to further exemplify the materiality of this piece, as one is drawn towards the iridescent shimmers and glimmers that seek to ornament and further accentuate the ‘oysters’ of this shrine.
Front: Raymond Huynh and Sydney Rock Oysters, Oyster Triptych, 2024, ceramic and porcelain, handmade ceramic glazes composed of oyster shells, mother of pearl lustre, dimensions variable.
Back: Jingru Mai (Moira), Quiet Hot Springs, 2024, blown glass, dimensions variable.
Photography by Jessica Maurer.
Additionally, through the appropriation of a triptych format for this installation, I intend to imbue these organisms with a sense of gravitas, by imparting the work with religious or spiritual connotations historically associated with painted triptychs in the Eurocentric art canon. The notion of ‘becoming with’ this organism is further exemplified through the creation of a sacred space, by having these pieces arranged in a shrine-like manner, and elevated/raised to place these participants towards the eye level of the audience/Anthropocene. Confronting the audience to meet their gaze towards the collaborators with their presence, and conveying a sense of mutual respect or ‘reverence’ for these organisms, as conventional hierarchies are questioned, when one (Anthropocene) interacts, and appreciates this constructed space/environment, and by extension the organism (oysters).
Therefore, by ‘opting out’ of ‘traditional hierarchies and power relations’ established by the Anthropocene, and ‘conventional’ art making practices; Oyster Triptych seeks to make or ‘become with’ oysters in the art making of this work. Working with the potent materiality of oyster and ceramics in this collaboration, to give agency or voice to the non-human, as one interacts with this constructed sacred space that seeks to imbue these organisms with a sense of gravitas or kinship.
BIO
Raymond Huynh is an emerging Sydney based artist who is currently studying at Sydney College of the Arts. He keeps a broad practice, working with ceramics, glass, sculpture, installation, and photo-media, drawing influences from ‘the elemental’, the environment, the human condition, and theories of craft. He specifically collaborates with ceramics, melding embodied knowledge and material focus into conceptual driven works, emphasising materiality, and harnessing the sensorial, transformational, and distinct processes and properties of materials. Currently, he is completing his last two units for his ‘fourth year’, whilst preparing research and material investigations for Honours in 2025. He hopes to be able to continue working as an artist, ceramicist and craftsperson following his studies at the University of Sydney.
Oyster Triptych was made in collaboration with the minerals embedded within the clay and oysters. Acknowledging their existence, and participation in the artmaking practice of this particular work.
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