Steven Rhall

Steven Rhall
Aboriginal Art Affects
Installation, dimensions variable (2019)

Centred within the encounter of art and audience, Aboriginal Art Affects critiques traditional exhibition modalities in the presentation of art by First Nation peoples. This work positions gallery, artwork and audience upon a figurative stage, borne by a framework of hierarchy and power. Upon this stage, measures of agency are apportioned (to each performer) through negotiations of activation – expressed as ideas of support, response, and affect.

How are elements within an exhibitionary framework (of art, audience and gallery) interdependent on activation and the formation of performative roles particular to each body (and their associated traditions within said framework)? How does each performer express themselves via the body of (each) other? Aboriginal Art Affects uses ideas of activation and stasis within the architectural and institutional body of the gallery to both approximate this framework and associated ideas of affect.

Documentation