Remedial Works at Perth Institute Of Contemporary Art (PICA) is a group exhibition that brings together six Australian and international artists whose works explore the novel and specific materials of contemporary global societies, and how these materials can affect human bodies, the environment and relationships.
The exhibition looks at how we are now placed within a unique environment of surfaces and substances – from rare earth metals and the ingredients of modern food science to consumer products, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals – equally palliative and poisonous and all connected to capital.
Recalling the maxim ‘the dose makes the poison’, the works in this exhibition look at the fine line between a material’s capacity to repair or pollute both bodies and land. While recognising that most of us are situated within the systems of industrial production and consumption, Remedial Works asks, in light of this, 'what role can art making perform towards remediation and healing?'
As part of Remedial Works, New South Wales based artist Clare Milledge will recreate Strigiformes; Binocular, Binaural, an artist-shamanic performance which was recently staged at the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design in Oslo, Norway. This will be the first time Clare, who is well-known for her paintings produced backwards on the reverse of glass sheets and for her accumulative total installation work, will enact a performative work in Australia.
Sophie Cassar - Untitled
Exhibition Curator Andrew Varano says themes of sickness and healing, human bodies and the land, repair and pollution are present within the exhibition, as are subjectivity, the senses, poetic language and the imagination.
"PICA has been thrilled to support Andrew Varano, a talented Western Australian curator, in the development and presentation of Remedial Works,” PICA Director Amy Barrett-Lennard says.
“It is an exhibition that tackles timely concerns for all of us living in a globalised world of abundance, aspiration and fear."
