Emerging in the 1970s initially as a photographer, Fiona Hall has shown how '...ordinary substances are transformed into extraordinary new presences' (Hoffie, 2005) in order to re/explore her perennial themes of 'interrelationships of life and death, beauty and violence' (ibid) or, as the Australian Government Culture Portal (2008) terms it, 'the relationship between nature and culture'. In this Sydney-born Hall was undoubtedly influenced by her scientist-mother, the bushland-setting of the family home and her extensive studies and travels overseas (ibid).
Ewington (cited in Hoffie, 2005), describes how in a recent retrospective (for example at Queensland Art Gallery and Christchurch Art Gallery 2008), Hall's work can be seen to have moved from representing connections between objects, materials and contexts to generating connections through her 'restless patterning'. Thus, Hall moved from documentary-style photos into maniplated images and, from the mid-1980's, into sculpture often using shredded metal, bank notes and beadwork to create botanical and faunal 'specimens' (real, imagined, endangered and/or extinct) arranged in museum-style cases in order to comment upon consumerism and its impact upon the natural world (as well as us).
Possibly these themes and connections are explemified by Hall's well-known Paradisus Terestris, 1989-90, her 'erotic sardine can[s]' (Australian Government, 2008): where peeled back cans reveal an isolated human body part out of which grows a leafy plant. Such works refer to such interconnected ideas as natural diversity, colonialism (such as the plants gathered by European explorers) and consequent exoticism, consumerism and human isolation and commodification. Here a humble tin - an unregarded and disposable object for food storage - is transformed into a fragile and vocal, work of beauty. Such works are clearly informed by Hall's studies into European literature, particularly its notions of good/evil and heaven/hell (Australian Government, 2008). This series can be viewed at the Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery website along with a comprehensive exhibition listing and visual chronology of Hall's extensive work.
In a similar vein, Mourning Chorus (2007-8), with its play on words is a more recent series of scultpures of imagined extinct birds composed of resin beaks applied to disposable plastic contrainers such as detergent bottles (MCA, 2008). Surely such work, reusing the thrown away, can be seen as owing much to both the Pop Art (1960-70s, USA) movement that raised ordinary consumables to iconic status while its handcrafted nature relates it to the Arts and Crafts Movement (mid-1800s, UK) that rebelled against mass-produced goods (Australian Government 2009).
References
Australian Government 2008 (last update 17 July), 'Fiona Hall', Australia's Culture Portal, http://www.cultureandrecreation.gov.au/articles/fionahall/, viewed on 6 August 2009.
Australian Government 2009 (last update 5 August), 'The Arts and Crafts movement in Australia', Australia's Culture Portal, http://www.cultureandrecreation.gov.au/articles/artsandcrafts/, viewed on 6 August 2009.
Churcher Betty 2006,
'Fiona Hall', Hidden Treasures, http://dl.screenaustralia.gov.au/module/849/, viewed on 6 August 2009.
Hall Fiona, 'Paradisus Terestris, 1989-90', Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, http://www.roslynoxley9.com.au/artists/17/Fiona_Hall/87/, viewed on 6 August 2009.
Hoffie Pat 2005, 'The Art of Fiona Hall', Artlink, http://www.artlink.com.au/articles.cfm?id=2280, viewed on 6 August 2009.
Museum of Contemporary Art Sydney 2008, Fiona Hall: Force Field, Education Kit, http://www.mca.com.au/general/Fiona%20Hall%20Force%20Field%20Education%20Kit.pdf, viewed on 6 August 2009.
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