Digital Wall Exhibition: I walk the line
The Digital Wall in the Bunjil Place foyer is a digital gallery space that exhibits video art and generative works from renowned artists and motion designers. Currently exhibiting is mesmerising stunning work I walk the line by renowned media artist Rose Staff.
I walk the line
Rose Staff, digital video, 10 minutes
Header image: I walk the line. Rose Staff, still from video
I walk the line is an artwork exploring the realm of abstract expressionism and action painting. In this piece we are looking at the performative act of painting and the gestures made while painting rather than the image created. The process of painting becomes a spontaneous act of movement as paint is applied to canvas. What results on the canvas of our artwork is not a picture but an event. We are not interested in depicting illusionistic scenes but rendering the energy and movement of life in a visible way on our surface.
Where we live and the spaces we inhabit have become acutely relevant during the pandemic of 2020. Freedom of movement has been restricted and the personal spaces we inhabit with one another reduced to minimise the spread of the virus. In our homes became the location of repeated gestures and actions as we lived in confined spaces. During this time we both began to paint as a process for emotional outlet and to reflect upon the historic events that have transitioned. The performative act of painting became the solace to the uncertainty.
The art historian Nicholas Chare has written that "the dynamics of action, as presented by Harold Rosenberg, have visual precursors in art of the past." One might go back to Michelangelo's drawings or even Rembrandt's paintings, but more immediately, one can point to Manet, the Impressionists and also Van Gogh, who emphasised the physical process of painting by not hiding the brushstrokes that made up the surfaces of their paintings.
Rose Staff
Rose Staff is a media visual artist, vj and motion graphic designer from Melbourne, Australia. She works with moving image and live video performance in a range of settings around the world, from contemporary art installations to large-scale vibrant projections at festivals and events. Her artworks have been shown at the Geneva Mapping Festival, Glastonbury Festival UK, VIVID Sydney, White Night Melbourne and at some of Australia's largest music festivals including Splendour in the Grass Stereo-sonic, Rainbow Serpent, Strawberry Fields and Let Them Eat Cake. She's been recognised in numerous design competitions and received the Adobe Top Talent Award in 2019. Rose has also been actively exhibiting her work in galleries in Australia, Europe and the UK for the last 17 years.
Using experimental hybrids of traditional and digital art forms, Rose explores how contemporary phenomena such as communication technologies and audio-visual space influence our perception of the modern world. Technology mediates between us and the world through micro perceptions of our sensors. It also affects our macro perceptions through the way we interpret and understand the world around us. It has the ability to change our perception of time, space and motion. Technologies do not simply create connections between people and their environment, it actively helps to constitute them. In her projects Rose is concerned with exploring this impact on human behaviour and how it can create perception shifts and new insights.
