Lyndal Osborne
Tracing Tides: A Topographical Investigation (installation detail), 2001-2012
image taken from The Telegram
Lyndal Osborne's printmaking and installation come together in a significant new traveling exhibition. "Where Rivers Meet Sea" begins its tour at The Rooms in St. John's, Newfoundland until December 2. Curator Melinda Pinfold, a University of Alberta Art and Design alumnus, has written an accompanying catalogue.
The result of several residencies and years of wandering along beaches in Canada and Australia, "Where Rivers Meet Sea" is a stunning, elaborate compendium of work conducted over the past twelve years. Shoalwan: River through Fire, River of Ice is a monumental installation that brings together the experience of two very different rivers, one near Canberra that had suffered a serious brush fire, and the other Edmonton's frozen North Saskatchewan. Tracing Tides: A Topographical Investigation carefully arranges found objects displayed on 25 two-tiered tables. The Flat Works rounds out the exhibition with selected prints that tie into the theme of water.
Lyndal Osborne
Shoalwan: River Through Fire, River of Ice (Installation detail) 2003
image taken from The Rooms exhibition
What connects all the works is the act of collecting, an activity that is the beginning of a long process of artistic translation. Osborne re-presents her discoveries in a rarefied way that does much more than simply replicate a subjective experience. It recontextualizes the objects, reframing them in a way that adds meaning - something that art does best. The exhibition is not about environmentalism per se, nor about ecology or phenomenology, and yet it is all these things and more.
Time and space are key factors in Osborne's work. The collections of objects take time to gather, then sit in the studio, are thought about, and finally are delicately selected, organized and arranged. Furthermore, it takes time for a viewer to absorb the work, akin to the slow time of painting. Space also plays a role, as Pinfold notes: "…the twenty-five tables of Tracing Tides are meant to be experienced, navigated, scrutinized, explored, discovered. And in Shoalwan: River through Fire. River of Ice, and throughout the rest of the exhibition, the viewer is invited to meander through the space, to look closer, to bend down, to squint, to peer, and to ponder. Osborne is well aware that this meandering is what her works invite, and she relishes it!"
Osborne was born in Newcastle, Australia and received her MFA in 1971 from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Since then she has been based in Edmonton and is now a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Art and Design at the University of Alberta.
A recent article on the exhibition by Karla Hayward of the St. John's Telegram is available here: