Artists do not stem from their childhood, but from their conflict with the achievements of their predecessors; not from their own formless world, but from their struggle with the forms which others have imposed on life - Andre Malraux
During long … formative periods such as childhood and early adulthood, localised natures are part of the materials used to produce a sense of home, belonging, attachment and familiarity – Adrian Franklin
During long … formative periods such as childhood and early adulthood, localised natures are part of the materials used to produce a sense of home, belonging, attachment and familiarity – Adrian Franklin
Threshold 2003
I experienced violent racism at school.
A feeling of belonging to no country haunted me into my late 20s.
My work developed a visual philosophy from the creative syntheses of painting and photography, particularly in relation to the ‘migrant’ landscape.
It has moved through symbol and metaphor, and from isolation to connection.
- Bette Mifsud
Threshold (2011) four suspended transparencies (each measuring 300 x 400 cm) forming a 'room', and a replica of an ancient wooden boat.
Landmarks Watermarks 1996
Landmarks Watermarks (1996), site-specific, two mode, multi-media installation for the Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney.
Mode 1: Projector on, projecting a single 675cm x 360cm. (ie. full wall size) of a dark watery cave entrance showing sea view through cave arc. Projection on back wall of gallery directly opposite entrance.
Sound track of lapping waves is running, all other lights off. This mode lasts for 1 minute, 20 seconds.
Mode 2: Sound and projected image fade to off over 10 seconds, while gallery lights slowly come on using 20 second dimmer. Static pictures and other objects now fully visible as in a conventional exhibition.
All equipment was synchronised using Dataton multimedia software operating the whole installation from a Mac LC computer.
Mode 1: Projector on, projecting a single 675cm x 360cm. (ie. full wall size) of a dark watery cave entrance showing sea view through cave arc. Projection on back wall of gallery directly opposite entrance.
Sound track of lapping waves is running, all other lights off. This mode lasts for 1 minute, 20 seconds.
Mode 2: Sound and projected image fade to off over 10 seconds, while gallery lights slowly come on using 20 second dimmer. Static pictures and other objects now fully visible as in a conventional exhibition.
All equipment was synchronised using Dataton multimedia software operating the whole installation from a Mac LC computer.
Landmarks Watermarks is dedicated to my parents, Veneranda and Giovanni Mifsud
Vault Suite 1991
1. Vault Suite (1991), site specific installation for Australian Perspecta 1991, at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. Its four components are:
2. Crypt, 173 x 127 cm (suspended in window) comprising 3 Cibachrome transparencies mounted on clear perspex, of (i) x-ray of a painting and frame by Jacopo di Cione (16th C Italian painter); (ii) x-ray of a female human chest; (iii) small circular micro-graphic cross-section of a painting surface also from the 16th C.
3. Vault, 184 x 101 x 50 cm, Wooden (Poplar) construction, showing my hand-carved side. This carving is a copy of the back of Jacopo di Cione's altar panel as shown in the work's conservator's photograph.
On the reverse face there is a black and white photograph, scanned directly onto the timber, of the same conservator's photograph of di Cione's central altar panel.
4. Installation view
5. Untitled, consists of two black and white photographic transparencies showing a positive (102 x 58 cm), and a negative (155 x 86 cm) respectively, of the hand-carved back of di Cione's panel.
(Old weathered timber planks resting against the wall, not shown here).
2. Crypt, 173 x 127 cm (suspended in window) comprising 3 Cibachrome transparencies mounted on clear perspex, of (i) x-ray of a painting and frame by Jacopo di Cione (16th C Italian painter); (ii) x-ray of a female human chest; (iii) small circular micro-graphic cross-section of a painting surface also from the 16th C.
3. Vault, 184 x 101 x 50 cm, Wooden (Poplar) construction, showing my hand-carved side. This carving is a copy of the back of Jacopo di Cione's altar panel as shown in the work's conservator's photograph.
On the reverse face there is a black and white photograph, scanned directly onto the timber, of the same conservator's photograph of di Cione's central altar panel.
4. Installation view
5. Untitled, consists of two black and white photographic transparencies showing a positive (102 x 58 cm), and a negative (155 x 86 cm) respectively, of the hand-carved back of di Cione's panel.
(Old weathered timber planks resting against the wall, not shown here).
The ubiquity of photography and its indeterminate identity, versus its determinate identity in relation to painting, is one of the themes addressed by Bette Mifsud’s work about photography. Three of her installations: “Hallucinations and Other Facts”, “Mute” and her most recent work for the 1991 Perspecta, [“Vault Suite”], directly address this particular problematic. Her work combines these polarized positions by acknowledging photography has an identity in relation to painting….
Dr Susan Best, Continuum, Vol 6/2
Mute 1990
Mute was shown as a solo exhibition at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney in from November 1991 through to January 1992.
Mute is comprised of four suspended large-format archival photographic transparency films, each measuring 230 x 110 cm.
1. An artificially coloured micrograph of the AIDS virus attacking human blood cells.
2. My hand-made colour photogram image (made without the use of a negative).
3. An artificially coloured Landsat image.
4. A black and white transparency measuring 110cm x 260cm of a 16th C woodblock print of a 'boar whale' - a hybrid animal resulting from the crossing of two other unrelated animals conjured up in the mind of the naturalist Konrad Gesner and taken from a book of "fanciful beasts".
5. A black and white photographic transparency reproduction of View of the Chateau of Versailles, painted by Pierre Patel the Elder in 1668, mounted on a mirror in a wooden frame, and measuring 96 x 69cm.
Mute is unique, and was produced by Fuji Film I&I, in Tokyo, Japan. $AUD15,000.
Mute was shown as a solo exhibition at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney in from November 1991 through to January 1992.
Mute is comprised of four suspended large-format archival photographic transparency films, each measuring 230 x 110 cm.
1. An artificially coloured micrograph of the AIDS virus attacking human blood cells.
2. My hand-made colour photogram image (made without the use of a negative).
3. An artificially coloured Landsat image.
4. A black and white transparency measuring 110cm x 260cm of a 16th C woodblock print of a 'boar whale' - a hybrid animal resulting from the crossing of two other unrelated animals conjured up in the mind of the naturalist Konrad Gesner and taken from a book of "fanciful beasts".
5. A black and white photographic transparency reproduction of View of the Chateau of Versailles, painted by Pierre Patel the Elder in 1668, mounted on a mirror in a wooden frame, and measuring 96 x 69cm.
Mute is unique, and was produced by Fuji Film I&I, in Tokyo, Japan. $AUD15,000.
Hallucinations and Other Facts 1988
untitled 1987
Pictures 1985