"What do the birds say?"
Glenn Barkley
Sullivan+Strumpf
799 Elizabeth St Zetland Sydney NSW 2017 Australia
P +61 2 9698 4696 e-mail:
1 > 30 April, 2020
Over the last six months Glenn Barkley has been producing a series of earthenware pots and objects that respond to catastrophic events across Australia. Twenty-six works tell the story of natural disaster from the artist’s perspective.
The title of the exhibition, What do the birds say?, is a quote from Kurt Vonnegut’s ‘Slaughterhouse-5’, in which the narrator apologises to his editor for producing a short manuscript. Like birds chirping, the book serves as an unpretentious message demonstrating that life still exists in a devastated world.
Vonnegut’s inquisitive bird returns in the very last line of the novel, leaving us with the unanswered question of what life is like in the aftermath of tragedy — life’s most devastating enemy.
Eschewing traditional techniques and forms, Barkley has crafted his own distinctive style that infuses literary quotes and references with embellishments that tell a story. Twigs and prunings join a variety of glazes to create eccentric vessels that respond to the artist’s surroundings. This combination of interests draws upon the artist’s love of reading and literature, gardening and nature, to create messages in Barkley’s bottles.
Glenn Barkley is an artist, writer, curator and gardener based in Sydney and Berry NSW, Australia. His work operates in the space between these interests drawing upon the history of ceramics, popular song, the garden and conversations about art and the internet.
Recent major exhibitions include imayimightimust, Sullivan+Strumpf, Sydney (2018); yetmorecontemporaryart, Artspace, Sydney (2017); the Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art: Magic Object, Art Gallery of South Australia (2016); The Garden of Earthly Delights, Westspace, Melbourne (with Angela Brennan) (2016); Watching Clouds Pass the Moon, Lake Macquarie Regional Gallery, NSW (2016); and Glazed and Confused: Ceramics in Contemporary Art Practice, Hazelhurst Regional Gallery, NSW (2014).
Barkley was previously senior curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (2008–14) and curator of the University of Wollongong Art Collection (1996–2007). He is co-founder and co-director of The Curators Department, Sydney and of kil.n.it experimental ceramics studio Glebe, Sydney.
He was a finalist in the 2017 Sidney Myer Ceramics Award and is held in numerous collections both nationally and internationally, including the Art Gallery of South Australia, National Gallery of Australia, Shepparton Art Museum and Artbank Sydney.
The title of the exhibition, What do the birds say?, is a quote from Kurt Vonnegut’s ‘Slaughterhouse-5’, in which the narrator apologises to his editor for producing a short manuscript. Like birds chirping, the book serves as an unpretentious message demonstrating that life still exists in a devastated world.
Vonnegut’s inquisitive bird returns in the very last line of the novel, leaving us with the unanswered question of what life is like in the aftermath of tragedy — life’s most devastating enemy.
Eschewing traditional techniques and forms, Barkley has crafted his own distinctive style that infuses literary quotes and references with embellishments that tell a story. Twigs and prunings join a variety of glazes to create eccentric vessels that respond to the artist’s surroundings. This combination of interests draws upon the artist’s love of reading and literature, gardening and nature, to create messages in Barkley’s bottles.
Glenn Barkley is an artist, writer, curator and gardener based in Sydney and Berry NSW, Australia. His work operates in the space between these interests drawing upon the history of ceramics, popular song, the garden and conversations about art and the internet.
Recent major exhibitions include imayimightimust, Sullivan+Strumpf, Sydney (2018); yetmorecontemporaryart, Artspace, Sydney (2017); the Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art: Magic Object, Art Gallery of South Australia (2016); The Garden of Earthly Delights, Westspace, Melbourne (with Angela Brennan) (2016); Watching Clouds Pass the Moon, Lake Macquarie Regional Gallery, NSW (2016); and Glazed and Confused: Ceramics in Contemporary Art Practice, Hazelhurst Regional Gallery, NSW (2014).
Barkley was previously senior curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (2008–14) and curator of the University of Wollongong Art Collection (1996–2007). He is co-founder and co-director of The Curators Department, Sydney and of kil.n.it experimental ceramics studio Glebe, Sydney.
He was a finalist in the 2017 Sidney Myer Ceramics Award and is held in numerous collections both nationally and internationally, including the Art Gallery of South Australia, National Gallery of Australia, Shepparton Art Museum and Artbank Sydney.
 | Glenn Barkley |
mpefm
AUSTRALIA art press release
