Corrugated cardboard, as an art-making material, only began appearing around the time of Pablo Picasso’s influential sculpture Still Life with Guitar (1913). Since then, the humble cardboard box has been used in a plethora of different ways including as a substrate for painting on (by artists such as Basquiat), as a material that rejects established art-hierarchies (by movements such as Arte Povera), and as a material that epitomizes environmental concerns around the re-use of materials.

Traditionally, the cardboard box is thought of as a vessel or container, which is associated with the packaging of commercial goods, and their distribution in the age of global markets. What happens when the cardboard box becomes a vessel for ideas or concepts?

In this exhibition we will seek to explore ways in which Australian artists in the 21st century leverage the materiality of such a modest item and incorporate it into their artworks as a way of engaging in the concepts which concern them.

The participating artists are:
Gabrielle Bates, Patrizia Biondi, Tracey Clement, Scott Duncan, David Manley, Sean Rafferty.

Gallery

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