William Mora Galleries

Neil Emmerson Selection

(oriental flag)
1999, engraving on blanket, approx 230 x 160cm

(surrender) and (penance)
1999, installation shot

(falling boy)
1999, engraving on blanket, approx 230 x 160cm

IWYS (cat. 18)
1999, unique state print, photolithography and stenciled woodblock, 40 x 30cm

IWYS (cat. 20)
1999, unique state print, photolithography and stenciled woodblock, 40 x 30cm

Biography and Qualifications

Currently lives and works in Newcastle

Master of Visual Arts, Sydney College of the Arts, University of Sydney, 2001 Lecturer at the Australian Catholic University, Strathfield, NSW

Description of Work

Neil Emmerson is a Newcastle-based printmaker, critically acclaimed for innovative and challenging explorations of his medium. Often working in unique state rather than multiple images, and with materials including printed and shaved blankets, laser-cut perspex and lithographed handkerchiefs, Emmerson's commitment to printmaking may be explained more by its connotations of intimacy ("would you like to come up and see my etchings?") and subversion than its potential for multiplicity.

Emmerson's work aims to occupy shifting and multi-faceted positions, attempting to confuse historically established dichotomies - public/private, east/west, political/personal. A consistent tactic used by the artist is the layering of forms to allow rich, associative readings within and between his work, bringing together iconographies whose relationships are not obvious; European fin-de-siecle decadence meets the Chinese socialist revolution, for example. Another repeated concern is the means through which acceptable masculine identity is constructed and circumscribed, and the possibility of finding slippages around these orthodoxies.

Awards/Exhibitions

Emmerson has held around twenty solo exhibitions since 1983, including six with William Mora Galleries. He has held numerous lecturer, board and committee positions. Recent residencies and exhibitions include:

Collections

Newcastle Region Art Gallery; Maitland City Art Gallery; Baker and McKenzie, Melbourne; AMP; Monash University, Melbourne; National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Ian Potter Museum of Art, University of Melbourne; Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane; Deakin University, Melbourne; private collections around Australia

Selected bibliography

ANDERSON, Peter, "Above and beyond", Art + Text, Number 56, 1997, p 97

EWINGTON, Julie, "Island to Island: Australia to Chenju", Chenju Pre-Biennial exhibition catalogue, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 1995

McDONALD, Ewen, The Expanded Field, ex cat, Monash University Gallery, Melbourne, 1998

SCHUBERT, Robert, "Cultural Revelation", World Art, Number 2, 1995, p 34

 

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