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| Michelle Heldon, Day by day project, 2011, Kemijarvi |
Michelle Heldon’s Gunyah residency will create a hypothetical parallel across time, space and climate linking her North Arm Cove experience to a residency she undertook last year, November 2011, in Kemijarvi, Finland. Her Kemijarvi residency explored a 'diary' project created from day to day explorations out in the elements. Michelle and her artworks experienced winter’s form in the arctic circle in Lapland - a completely foreign landscape and culture for her. That project produced a series of site responsive drawings, paintings and short films. Michelle’s Gunyah residency will mirror her Kemijarvi project exactly a year later, on the other side of the world in the familiar landscape of Australia. She will be again exploring a specific area, climate and her response to it at this time of year. Michelle is hoping to form a relationship between the two projects and then let them meet one another in an exhibition next year.
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| Michelle Heldon, Day by day project, 2011, Kemijarvi |
My art practice explores the poetics of space and memory through a focus on landscape and its elements. I work across installation, assemblage, painting, drawing and sculpture. When we are in the environment and we slow down, we experience the place around us, through not just what we see but also what we feel. I collect many things from my everyday journeys, whether it be through drawing, physically picking up objects, or memory. These collected moments or memories form a history and focus on the essence and heart of a place. My study pays particular attention to the web of interrelationships in our environment—to the physical, biological, cultural, and historical aspects of ecological systems. My works employ natural materials, or engage with environmental forces such as wind, water, or sunlight. My recent project in Nov 2011, Day to Day in Lapland, Finland was a project by which a ‘diary’ was formed by painting in the icy elements everyday. Letting the landscape seep into me and directly affect the works with its character and mood of that particular place and moment allowed the authenticity of the surroundings be captured. Recently I have been exploring the role of the ‘artist’ in facilitating a gateway or bridging between the elemental world and the ‘world’ that is presented to the viewer. I am seeking further practices to engage the public and community in an active and participatory way.
Michelle Heldon
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| Michelle Heldon, Day by day project, 2011, Kemijarvi |
Michelle Heldon studied at the National Art School and Tom Bass Sculpture School. She has been a Finalist in the Waterhouse Natural History Prize 2010, awarded the 2008 Tom Bass Scholarship and the 2006 William Fletcher Trust Grant, and won the FONAS prize for Painting. Michelle has exhibited at Kemijarvi Artist residency gallery in Lapland, Gaffa Galleries in Sydney, g8 on george in the Rocks and Pine Street Creative Arts Centre in Chippendale. She is currently working at the Musuem of Contemporary Art Australia and studying art therapy.
