The month leading up to Thought and Action week, my focus has been settled on the concept of ‘control’.  One of the first tutorials that I had, ‘control’ was mentioned as a distinguishable symptom within my work in both concept and design. This was something that I had not necessarily recognised prior to the conversation. But this was a truth and that truth made me swell in my own discomfort. It was a humbling experience for this to have been recognised through the eyes of another. Within the intricacies of my body of work, is an unnerving urgency for control. The miniature dioramas that have become synonymous with my practice have always resembled elements of my personal life, often manifestations of memory, trauma, and spaces where uncertain events have occurred.  The approach of working in miniature- allows the intangible to exist tangibly. Memory translates into something I can hold and handle and curate however I please. It gratifies me with a sense of control and authority over my history and is what introduced a therapeutic element to my process.  

The topic of ‘destruction’ was introduced as a contrast to this inherent desire for control, specifically destruction as a means of catharsis and liberation. Spectatorship has always been something I am actively trying to evolve within my work. I hold the personal belief that an audience cannot fully engage with a piece of art if they must ask for permission to be immersed. This is what drew me to the concept of destruction performed under the guise of ‘accident’ rather than something instructed (ie. Rhythm 0). The intention was to curate a piece that was placed in a way that made it impossible for the audience to not knock it over. This allowed the audience to become central to the work itself whilst also opening a new path of practice that would challenge my usual process.  

I began looking into different artists who used either/both destruction and disorientation to engage with their audience. Musician, Jem Finer performed a piece at Cafe Oto where he presented himself as though he were to perform a conventional piano piece, only to soon twist the handle on the audience and proceed to deconstruct said piano, smashing it keys, pulling and cutting its strings – what the audience don't realise initially is that they are witnessing the performance, the unintelligible, chaotic and unsettling sounds that echo from the pianos dismantled chambers are the sounds of Finers song.  

I also researched Gregor Schneider’s work, specifically his piece ‘Haus u r’ and the disorientating nature he engages in by moving around the rooms in the house whilst the audience walk through it. What I love about this piece is how Schneider made it so that the audience are not just spectators but unknowing participants. It is a notable example of audience immersion- for said participants would often find themselves getting lost in Schneiders' labyrinth of sterile walls and vast doorways leading to nowhere, due to the ever-changing blueprint of his design.  

I also found interest in Jean Tinguely’s self-destructive works, especially what was written by Peter Selz regarding the piece in ‘HOMAGE TO NEW YORK – a self-constructing and self-destroying work of art conceived and built by Jean Tinguely’ 

“Jean Tinguely’s experiments are works of art which time, movement and gesture are demonstrated – not merely evoked – machines are no more permanent than life itself, their time runs out, destroying themselves.” 

My intention was to create a ‘façade’ of a conventional installation – I was to hang two of my boxes on a wall in a dark space that would be tied to an invisible string or some sort of motion sensor that would be triggered by a swinging door mechanism that would cause the boxes to fall and smash on the ground as soon as someone entered the room. The only light in the space would be two spotlights shining down at the floor where the box would have fallen, causing the audience to only witness the piece when it was destroyed. The audience would then be asked to rebuild the box, and the cycle would repeat itself. The idea was for the piece to lose its ownership as well as its ego, the repetition of destroying and rebuilding would cause the boxes to take form under the hands of several artists (‘the audience’).  

There were numerous factors as to why I could not pursue this idea for Thought and Action. 

Complex engineering was limited by the health and safety policies and the time frame. I was met with a lot of dead-ends and advice from technicians who were unsure if I would be able to pull it off because of this. This caused me to have to re-evaluate and re-design the piece several times. However, each design would be met with another fault or technical issue. I realised most of my weeks had been spent trying to figure out the mechanisms to make the piece work rather than executing the piece itself and I soon found myself running out of time. The work almost began to morph into this impossible riddle that I was spending all my energy trying to figure out. As though every loophole I had found, had a concrete wall secretly placed behind it. In total the piece had around eight different versions, which had all failed to work. The week before the show, when it became clear that I was not going to be able to paint my idea the way I desired, I faced a real exhaustion in spirit and doubt in myself as both an artist and person.  A few circumstances in my life caused me to feel entirely overwhelmed in my personal life and completely underwhelmed in my practice.  

But a good friend once said to me that she believed ‘faith’ and ‘doubt’ go hand in hand, neither can exist without the other.    



Technicians had suggested I try to fictionalise the piece, through a series of photographs or as a film, but I personally felt that would defeat the initial point and would become something that strayed from what I was focused on. In my sketchbook, I wrote : 

Trying too hard leads to nothing, let it fail, let it disappoint – why am I so eager to avoid disappointment? Disappointment is just another reaction; it does not necessarily contrast a successful piece. I am unable to conceive of this idea as of now, perhaps I won't ever be able to. I want to present something authentic, I need to be honest with myself.   

So, I held up a white flag and surrendered to the idea – instead of producing a piece under the scope of perfected curation, I decided to put my thought into action and show what I had made, an incomplete idea that was unable to be progressed further. An abandoned project, an unfinished sketchbook.  

I knew I wanted to create a space that was ‘difficult’ to be in, a space that was atmospherically overwhelming and immediately immersive, something that could be remembered in fragments, but never whole. I wanted to make a piece that portrayed exactly where I was at, whilst allowing others to make of it as they will – I did not intend for it to make sense, I wanted it to exist in its ambiguity – the piece was not about discomfort it was discomfort. This is why a part of me really struggled to talk about the work upon reflection, I wasn't entirely sure what I had created, all I knew was that it cut close to the bone and unsettled me profoundly. I felt I had made something bigger than myself, as though the work had authority over me and had reopened a closed wound without my consent.  

Michael Sandel writes in his book ‘JUSTICE’  

“Once the familiar turns strange, it’s never quite the same again. Self-knowledge is like lost innocence however unsettling you find it, it can never be unthought or unknown. What makes this enterprise difficult but also riveting is that moral and political philosophy is a story, and you don't know where the story will lead but you do know that the story is about you”

The sound that accompanied the piece was a variation of recorded conversation, static noise, a piano piece I had made and a song I had made in reverse.  

A few days before Thought and Action I watched Hanekes’ ‘The Seventh Continent’ for the first time. The film was a point of reference for me when describing the concept of ‘catharsis birthed from destruction.’ What struck me the most from the film was the last scene with the static tv and the way in which the harsh sound of the static slowly begins to resemble a strangely blissful translation of the waves hitting the shore in “Australia” - I really loved this nuance of bliss and misery and how they almost began to merge when the film had finished.  

Initially one would most likely find it difficult to stay in the room for any longer than a minute, but I think if you allowed yourself to sit in that discomfort, a sense of catharsis or self-surrender would be achieved, all senses would be so overwhelmed there would be no space left for thought just being. This is why I encouraged the audience to sit in the space with a sign outside of the entrance.  

The title, ‘Liberation from Thought’ came from something I read and resonated with in a Gregor Schneider book, artist, Ulrich Looch writes on Schneiders practice and specifically control -  

“the meditative, calming effect of repetitive tasks is for him, a liberation from thought and commitment to action – pure activity for its own sake without the intrusions of external reality”