Topography of the Mind
Residence Artist Sam Doctor
Artist Talk 24th August (Fri) 17:00~18:00 Party 18:00~19:00
Venue: B105 AFT Open Space
Open Studio 26th August (Sunday) 12:00-19:00
Venue: B108 Residence Studio
Sydney based artist Sam Doctor is joining 3331's residence program throughout August. His art practice centering on video, sculpture, photography and performance can be seen as an ongoing confrontation between humankind and the environment, highlighting the fragility of mankind in the face of natural forces, exposing the Faustian side of human nature and our will to contain what cannot be contained.
"Surveying over six years of my previous works, it is striking to what extent landscaped has assumed a variety of different functions and faces. The work from 2006, Places we have never been documented landscapes ranging from mountains, mist and glacial terrains. Where night falls all day long (2008) depicted rock faces, a quarry and the remnants of burnt-out buildings. Furthermore my recent work A Song for the Stone Breakers (2011), I captured the landscape of a live sulphuric volcano billowing sallow smoke and ash surrounded by a steely, turquoise-coloured acid lake. In each of these cases landscape is used as a contemplative surface, a communicative mechanism, and a vehicle for conveying a complex and sometimes conflicted emotive state."
Sam Doctor
Through his residency Sam Doctor has been researching the emotional, spiritual and psychological states that landscape can provoke, exploring these through an experiential journey into the mystical practices of Japanese mountain asceticism. Through arduous mountain climbs combined with the peace and beauty of the natural world, he attempts to purify his perception, revitalize his energy and reconnect with his truest, while at the same time connecting and interacting with the high velocity of Tokyo's urban life, questioning how one might integrate with both environments without a sense of disengagement from one location to another; or if in fact one world revolves around the other. The outcomes of these investigations will be presented in an open studio to be held on 26th August.
Artist url: http://vimeo.com/16487389
