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The 2007 Anne & Gordon Samstag
International Visual Arts Scholarships

| Anthea Behm | Sarah CrowEST | Kirra Jamison | Paul Knight |
| Jess MacNeil | Nick Mangan |

Artist: Nick Mangan


Doomdrum 2005
found floor drum, speaker, wood veneers, found dowel, found teak, sound
75 x 45 x 50 cm
© the artist


The Colony 2005
axe, shovel and hammer handles, found dowel, found teak forks and spoons,
western red cedar, elk hair, nylon hair, jute, teak stainer, wooden chopsticks
400 x 155 x 155 cm
© the artist
 


The sculptures that Nick Mangan makes are essentially accretions, sometimes geological, like crystals; sometimes organic, like coral. They also incorporate unexpected combinations of objects, and reflect the collage principle that has continually influenced art since Picasso began sticking bits of bric-a-brac together a century ago. Mangan expresses an interest in the proliferation of exotic souvenirs associated with trade routes and colonialism. The meaning and use of such objects transforms as their location alters, and they become recontextualized in a global system of information and commodity exchange. Mangan’s constructed hybrids are analogous to the collage society we live, pieced together from fragments so diverse that their origins are almost meaningless.

His sculptures suggest the way that geographical and cultural divisions have dissolved to the point where everything is more or less loosely connected. It is not, however, the connections that seem most significant. He expresses the accompanying dissolution. Termites provide a very useful analogy for this dual process because they not only invade and destroy objects, but also rearrange and construct matter. Mangan’s sculpture The Colony suggests both growth and decay. The spiky construction of chewed wood could be alternatively read as skeletal remains or a thrusting edifice.

Timothy Morell
from his Samstag catalogue essay;
Loose connections


Born 1979, Geelong, Victoria
2001 Bachelor of Arts (Fine Art), Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne
Awards 2007 Anne & Gordon Samstag International Visual Arts Scholarship
2006 Australia Council, Greene Street studio residency, New York.
2004 ANZ Bank Private, emerging artist program
  2003 Arts Victoria, new work grant
Individual Exhibitions 2006 Sutton Gallery, Melbourne
2005 The Colony, Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne
2003 In the crux of matter, Sutton Gallery, Melbourne
2002 The Obolus, Studio 12, Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne
2001 OBTX4Plastralwallmold, Penthouse and Pavement Gallery, Melbourne
Selected Group Exhibitions 2006 Uncanny Nature, Australian Centre For Contemporary Art, Melbourne
Adventures with form in space: The Fourth Balnaves Foundation Sculpture Project, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Recent Acquistions, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney
Super Natural, The Physics Room, Christchurch, New Zealand
2005 Slave, VCA Gallery, Melbourne
Re:thinking, BUS, Melbourne
  2004 2004: Australian Culture Now, Ian Potter Centre, National Gallery of Victoria;
and ACMI, Melbourne
Primavera, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney
2004 National Works on Paper, Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, Mornington, Victoria
“Drawing”, Mir11, Melbourne
Work in progress, Spacement, Melbourne
  2003 vécu, Conical, Melbourne
Compendium, Platform, Melbourne
  2002 In the Making, 1st Floor Artists’ and Writers’ Space, Melbourne
Carbon Copy and Giant Molecules, Penthouse and Pavement, Melbourne
Pure Negativity, Westspace, Melbourne
Mutable Spaces, Metro Arts, Brisbane
Only the Lonely, Block Gallery, Sydney
Why do Birds Suddenly Appear, Boutwell Draper Gallery, Sydney
  2001 200 Gertrude St Studio artists show, Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne
Mixed bag, collaboration with Masato Takasaka and Bianca Hester, Ocular Lab, Melbourne
Collections   National Gallery of Victoria
Monash University Museum of Art
Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney
Artbank
 

| Anthea Behm | Sarah CrowEST | Kirra Jamison | Paul Knight |
| Jess MacNeil | Nick Mangan |