Modes of Practice at Verge Gallery brought together past and present committee members of the artist run initiative, MOP Projects—Ron Adams, Kate Beckingham, Kieran Butler, Lucas Davidson, Daniel Hollier, Richard Kean and Carla Liesch in this timely exhibition. As artists, our mode of practice is our way of thinking about and through making, a process-driven philosophy that is nurtured through the experimental nature of our artist-run-spaces. These artists have worked together before, their object-based and expanded ideas of art-making engage in an ongoing dialogue with each other, and the space in which they are exhibiting. The artists have all developed work from significant moments working with MOP Projects, as they celebrate the end of an important fourteen-year Sydney institution.
It has been difficult to write this essay because I have mixed feelings about MOP closing. MOP has been fundamental to my identification and formative years as a practicing artist. And MOP is closing at a very complex time in Australian arts; so how do we celebrate the end of such an important space? Modes of Practice is not simply the last MOP Project, but it is taking place in the midst of what has been described as the worst crisis the Australian arts have faced since the Australia Council was formed in 1967.
You do not have to be abreast of the entirety of the situation to experience the mood in which we currently find ourselves working—one dominated by anxiety and uncertainty for the future of the arts in Australia. Certainly, when decision-making from the top shuts down avenues for critical and creative thinking, the future seems a dangerous one.
And we exhibit here in this significant location—significant geographically to