John Austin Photography

Remnants Exhibition
Collie Art Gallery, Collie, Western Australia

Paintings by Galliano Fardin, Lori Pensini and Tony Windberg, sculpture by Sandra Hill and Kim Perrier and photographs by me, curated by Joshua Thomason of Quinninup

Firstly the gallery. The Collie Art Gallery is a surprising achievement for a tiny coal mining town. It is a brand new, simple and elegant building with an exterior that has echos of past railway architecture, appropriate for the location. The entry is large, and just messy enough to be welcoming, this is a compliment. The main gallery states less about itself and more about the work than any other I have been in(1). The gallery in Collie was the work of a group of local women with Jan Wallace as the main instigator

Collie Art Gallery WA

Collie Art Gallery WA

Collie Art Gallery WA

My part in the exhibition is twelve silver gelatine prints of forest subjects, images from 1996 to 2003. There is nothing newer on this subject as by 2003 I was in a depression from the forest work I had been doing. This depression has returned while working on the selection and presentation of the prints, mainly vintage with the addition of three new prints from the Melaleuca Swamp series. Witnessing, documenting and fighting against the destruction of forest did that

(1 The two main regional galleries in the south of WA are old buildings with art galleries shoe horned into them, and neither really work, despite the best efforts of their directors and staff)

(2 Not that I still believe work in an art gallery can do that)