“Perching on the edge of spaces, I watch through tiny peepholes, space stretches before me, parting with the weight of my feet. This place does not understand geography, it knows not of maps, borders or the certainty of direction. It embraces life and death simultaneously, as with violence and serenity. I stalk the horizon. It is constant, unfolding. As I watch soundlessly, my vision surges toward a swelling horizon, loping, creeping- continually rushing through several points in time, from source to outlet then source again.”
The wilderness offers a significant degree of concealment and mystery, of danger and discovery. This concealment entices the imagination to visualize what lies beyond ones immediate surroundings, the possibility of ‘yonder’. This vision materializes within the act of watching, hunting and waiting. It is utopic because it is entirely based on the poised act of survival; the hunt never truly comes to fruition, but is rendered half present and entirely mythical by the manifestation of the objects.
Hiders is a symbolic exploration of the nature of prey and predator, of the gaze and its object. Confusion is formed between the faceless body as a passive and vulnerable receptacle and the ‘other’ as hungry predator.
Eloise Kirk is a Sydney based artist. Her work is interdisciplinary and primarily includes small-scale sculpture, distorted and found objects, collage, assemblage and taxidermy. Having completed her MFA at Sydney College of the Arts in 2013 and exhibited in various Sydney galleries, regionally and interstate, Kirk has also studied Animal Artistry and Taxidermy at the Oregon Taxidermy Institute.
Kirk’s practice distorts and collapses cultural histories and navigates potential relationships between the natural landscape and the human artefact. She works within the premise of the ‘constructed backdrop’, creating conversational and exploratory relationships between organic materials, artificial props, distorted objects and found images.
Kirk subtly subverts anachronistic images of the sublime, composing unexpected connections between nature, masculinity, exploration and exoticism. Her fragmented objects are both connected to and dislodged from their original context. When placed in relation to each other they function as placeless palimpsests that are sensitive to the idea that thought will embrace a geographical space in such a way that, regardless if it is real or fictional, this space becomes an artefact of the imagination, a product of human thought.
Runway Journal acknowledges the custodians of the nations our digital platform reaches. We extend this acknowledgement to all First Nations artists, writers and audiences.
Runway Journal is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
Runway Journal receives project support from the NSW Government through Create NSW.
Runway Journal acknowledges the custodians of the nations our digital platform reaches. We extend this acknowledgement to all First Nations artists, writers and audiences.
Runway Journal is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
Runway Journal receives project support from the NSW Government through Create NSW.