LUMINOUSFLUX

Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery

The University of Western Australia, Perth

8 February – 20 April 2013

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LUMINOUSFLUX – Light is in the eye of the beholder

Amid the serene gardens of the University of Western Australia, the Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery plays host to an exhibition of tension. A series of works by nine Australian and international artists—each drawing upon the various properties of artificial light—challenges visitors to contemplate the relationship between darkness and light, and in turn between art and science. As promised by its title, the LUMINOUSFLUX exhibition is at once a feast for the eyes and a tribute to the power of light, with each piece demonstrating how light can hypnotise, mesmerise and deceive through shadow, reflection and refraction. By deploying common technologies in a series of unconventional ways, the exhibition demands that we think about the transformation that occurs as light excites the eye and stimulates the imagination.

The electrification of life—and the consequent defeat of the night—is the quintessential modern story recast by Brendan Van Hek’s Colour Composition #3(2013). When, at the start of the twentieth century, Italian Futurists endeavoured to represent the dynamism of modern life—the speed of the automobile, the cacophony of the electrified urban environment—they often found themselves frustrated by an inability to communicate their excitement through traditional media. It is as if Van Hek’s piece has discovered the proper medium of the future in neon. In this piece, dynamic lines are transported from Futurist canvases and brought into life through the use of found and recycled neon fluorescents. Various pieces of erstwhile advertising slogans are reset in a work that at once evokes the mesmerising brilliance of the urban setting and the exciting sense of adventure promised by the sparkling lights of the city.

The bustle

Rebecca Baumnann, Reflected Glory, 2013. ETC Source Fours, mirror, origami paper, perspex, wrapping paper, dimensions variable. Courtesy the artist.

Brendan Van Hek, Colour Composition #3, 2013. Found neon, metal hooks, dimensions variable. Courtesy the artist.