Death -Insights on Life
by Australia's first art exhibition on the theme of Death, NSW
Executive Manager, JCNT, Rookwood, Aged 60
The following article was written by the undersigned for the quarterly journal of the Australian Cemeteries and Crematorium Association 1998.
Death -Insights on Life
Pulling together Australia's first art exhibition on the theme of Death was quite an experience. Organising and keeping a nationwide touring exhibition moving over the past four years has been an experience of a different kind.
The initial idea was to promote themes from the nation's largest cemetery by using art to break down subconscious taboos held by the community and promote interest in dissolving the mystique of cemeteries.
Art exhibitions depend on Art Funding and Art Funding is highly specialised and irregular. I had been successful in 1991 with the Australia Council assisting the Joint Committee of Necropolis Trustees with "Journey" by the Adelaide artist, Hossien Valamanesh. This work of stone and bronze features in the setting of the western gate to Rookwood.
Art funding all becomes more complicated when several grants are required from several different sources, all working to different time tables with various funding criteria. Art funding is directed at certain themes often subject to changing Federal Government policy. Our journey started in 1994 with various applications to the Australia Council and NSW Ministry for the Arts. By early 1996 I had enough funding commitments to start a team of artists. Eileen Chanin of Macquarie Galleries, Sydney, helped select a panel of artists and arrange a tentative itinerary of galleries from all over Australia before she went overseas. Additional funding needed for touring costs from Visions of Australia and assistance from the NSW government were looking promising and seven of Australia's noted artists had promised works on themes of their own choosing through 1996. The program envisaged that artists would have their work advanced enough for us to have time to prepare the all-important exhibition catalogue for the tour to start in early in 1997. Specialised packing and transport would be arranged over the Christmas recess. I began looking for writers and, as always, more funding. Fortunately, I was successful in attaining the services of Dr Phillip Kent, Professor Joan Kerr and Eileen who contributed their writings gratis. With the artists' works well advanced we were able to settle the theme of the exhibition as "Death - Insights on Life."
The three months from December 1996 were hectic as we coped with artists finishing their work at the twenty third hour, manufacturing the specialised packaging, arranging insurance, agreements and conservation procedures between all the various parties involved in the first stage of the tour which covered eight regional galleries in four states. By the time we had reached the starting point two years had elapsed, more than a dozen funding applications had been made, the NSW Ministry for Arts had been wound up, negotiations had been made with more than ten artists, a dozen galleries, graphic artists and art printers, various carriers, insurers and advisers.
When the exhibition reached the public it was highly acclaimed by the art community. The range and calibre of the art matched the depth of the exhibition theme. Regional gallery curators were greatly impressed. Tom Arthur's bronze sculptures presented poetry and music, Ken Unsworth's columns depict the individualism of life (and death) with some reminiscences of his National Memorial to Australia's Vietnam Forces, Anne Macdonald depicted disappointment and decay; Leah-King-Smith depicts the primordial precedence of the first humans to tread Australia; Robyn Stacey depicts the surprises of life as it passes through many doors; Laurens Tan depicts the lottery of life with electronic glitz and Fiona Hall shows how the rivers of life lay between universes of common atoms.
Since the tour began we have been successful in winning a further grant from Visions of Australia to extend the exhibition to Western Australia and northern Queensland where it is due to end in October this year. By that time it is estimated that 60,000 people would have seen it, many of them school children I noted with interest that themes of our exhibition are represented in the recent State-wide exhibition of school works. It seems that the upcoming generation are shaking off the taboo of death already. One of Fiona Halls' work was leant to the National Gallery of Victoria in 1997 where Fiona carried off first prize for contemporary art.
I would like to express appreciation to all those people who have helped make the exhibition a success. There are over sixty now. Also the funding bodies who make art possible in Australia especially Visions of Australia, Australia Council and the NSW Government who indemnified the tour.
Cemeteries are places of culture. Art relates to culture and communicates to the wider sphere. Cemeteries and art can be put together to form an impressive incorporeal relationship.
A final word on the artists. Their rewards are meagre yet their contribution to society can not be understated.
Lee Squires
Copyright © Australian Museum, 2009