Belles-lettre is a project consisting of separate installations by three artists, Maureen Burns, Gail Hastings and Virginia Ward. Based in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth respectively, each has devised a site-specific work for ACCA which explores new definitions of sculpture and the relationships between object, text and space. The ephemeral nature of the communications — both textural and spatial — connects the three installations in belles-lettres, which individually explore cultural terrains and practises.
Media Release, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, 6 August 1993
EXPANSION Wanting some guidance for this essay, I browse amongst the rows of books. Selecting one, I turn to a page and read that … science is endeavouring to discover a Theory of Everything. The Theory of Everything will be represented by a mathematical equation of compressed information. (1) Desiring to understand, I turn the page and initially feel slightly affronted. For before me, running over the top of the words, sprinting so as not to get caught — is a child’s robust scribble. Scribbled as if in a quick fury and in a moment snatched — unobserved by the parent as they were perhaps looking elsewhere, perhaps driving with the child in the back seat on their way to return the book to the library. An expression of rage, a silent protest, marking the absurdity of growing up. Perhaps summoned by the indignity suffered when one begins to discover that life is not about possibility and expansion, but probability and compression. Shelved. While the physical scale of the library’s passageways diminish — surprisingly, the place to which the most diminished, such as a sentence of words, eventually leads is enormous. It contains you and me, the trees the flowers, the sun the moon — and the library.
Gail Hastings, excerpt, A Sculpture by Gail Hastings: a page torn from a secret, in Jenepher Duncan (ed.), exhibition catalogue, Australian Centre of Contemporary Art, Melbourne, 1993.
Exhibition | |
Date: | 05/Aug/1993 to 05/Sep/1993 |
At: | Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne |
Artists: |
Maureen Burns, Gail Hastings, Virginia Ward |
List of Works: |
by Gail Hastings A Sculpture by Gail Hastings: a page torn from a secret |
Download: |
Catalogue: A Sculpture by Gail Hastings: a page torn from a secret, 1993 |
Bibliography: | Edward Colless, ‘The Secret History’, in Ashley Crawford (ed.), World Art, Ashley Crawford, Melbourne issue Inaugural, November 1993, p.38. Gail Hastings, Gail Hastings: a page torn from a secret, in Jenepher Duncan (ed.), exhibition catalogue, Australian Centre of Contemporary Art, Melbourne |
Image: |
a page torn from a secret by Gail Hastings |
Australian Centre for Contemporary Art Dir: Jenepher Duncan Dallas Brooks Drive |
Gail Hastings Installation 1989 / Fergus Armstrong Photograph 1989, Store 5, Melbourne
Suzannah Barta, Sandra Bridie, Lyndell Brown, Gail Hastings, Store 5, Melbourne
This Performance — A Passing Thought, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne
S.W.I.M. Fund Raiser, Linden Centre for Contemporary Arts, Melbourne
Melinda Harper, Gail Hastings, Gary Wilson, Constanze Zikos, FirstDraft Gallery, Sydney
Some examples of different ways, Store 5, Melbourne
No, just an empty square, Store 5, Melbourne
Production, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane
Australian Perspecta 1991, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Gail Hastings & Elizabeth Newman, Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney
Lovers, Heidi Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne
To make a work of timeless art, Artspace, Sydney
Road to Love, Sarah Cottier Gallery, Sydney
out of time: part two, David Pestorius Gallery, Brisbane
Art 1996 Chicago, David Pestorius Gallery, Chicago
Reservoir, Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery, Lake Macquarie
The Pool, Centenary Pools, Brisbane
To make a work of timeless art, Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide
To make a work of timeless art, David Pestorius Gallery, Brisbane
Wall as Medium?, David Pestorius Gallery, Brisbane
four coincidences, Anna Schwartz Gallery, Melbourne
Duality: a series of weekly exhibitions during April 1997, David Pestorius Gallery, Brisbane
Art 1997 Chicago, David Pestorius Gallery, Chicago
two corners and a cube, Galerie Köstring/Maier, München
On Dialogue, Haus am Waldsee, Berlin
two and three stares, Galerie Mark Müller, Zurich
Statements Art 28‘97 Basel, David Pestorius Gallery, Basel
forgotten encyclopaedias, 24 Church Street, Fortitude Valley, Brisbane
Art Forum Berlin 1997, David Pestorius Gallery, Berlin
To complete a work of contemporary art, Ausstellungsraum Thomas Taubert, Düsseldorf
art idea no. 8,582,048, Bahnwärterhaus, Esslingen
Close Quarters: Contemporary Art from Australia and New Zealand, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane
art idea no. 8,582,048, Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin
projections, David Pestorius Gallery, Berlin
apparently not, David Pestorius Gallery, Berlin
I views, Canberra Contemporary Art Space, Canberra
Close Quarters: Contemporary Art from Australia and New Zealand, ANU School of Art Gallery, Canberra
The Space Here Is Everywhere: Art with Architecture, Villa Merkel/Bahwärterhaus, Esslingen
Space Affects: the art and architecture of James Birrell and Gail Hastings, Metro Arts, Brisbane
Open House, Pestorius Sweeney House, Brisbane
OUI we, The Commercial, Sydney
20/20, Sarah Cottier Gallery, Sydney
Exhibition: To Do, The Commercial, Sydney
Missing: four sculptuations by Gail Hastings, Apple Books, Available in 51 countries
Melbourne Art Fair, The Commercial, Melbourne
Taking it all away: MCA collection, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney