Spun dry...

Whatever happened to Ginny? Well, the tea-towels came down off the line and she's been busy investigating new opportunities for further cunning stunts.

Between sending off acquittal for Janet Holmes a Court NAVA grant - thanks a million - and investigating a stint with Art on the Move to travel Spin Cycle across country (Share the love, you know it) and tossing a hat in the ring for a few other 'possibles' Virginia has been diligently stitching together another chapter...

A wedding, a baby, a move and trips to the never-never with Awesome Arts have thus far kept Virginia's creative escapades at bay, however in light of her new experiences she may have some additional juice to inject into her next intimate public offering.

Postcards - possibly notes to self will be forthcoming. ..Stay tuned to a tree near you...or possibly quite far away from you...

love love love x

She Speaks

Outed at last, Virginia spoke to the masses crammed into the Bunbury Regiona Art Galleries exhibition space on August 1st to speak to her audience about the inner workings of her Cunning Stunt machinations.

Ginny does Abbey Rd

Toting our most precious possessions we boarded the galleries vessel for a morning of delight and solidarity among a collection of newly recruited Virginias. As one observer duly commented to a delighted Ms Cunningham; 'I'd be disappointed if I didn't have a little bit of Virginia in me'.

Helen and Jean Speak, Steam and Spray

Virginia spoke of her humble origins, her exhibition intentions and what the future may hold for a Virginia scattered across the state in all directions. From her humble regional roots she has grown in confidence and strength and plans to continue her Granny Guerrilla actions in the urban and rural landscape. In the Kimberley, Derby and Broome Dwellers may be in for the occasional humble domestic artistic fancy swinging modestly from the trees to announce her 'spreading of wings' into other regional areas.

Helen Shows how it is done in style

Audience members were delightfully generous in recounting personal stories aroused in response to the exhibition and the tea towels on show. Virginia was humbled by the beautiful anecdotes bravely shared in the space. Many women spoke of the traditions and generations of home-making handed down over the years. The teatowels - in their suffocating domesticity - struck a chord with many participants who responded to the intensity of the claustrophobic intimacy of the doemstic sphere re-created in the installation space.

All in all, between the squirt and hiss of the iron, Virginia managed to smooth out the wrinkles collected in her laundry basket with pride, nourished by the shared experience of those collected together on this most auspicious occasion.

Spun Dry

The Spin Cycle exhibition opening for Virginia Cunningham was a blast. Virginia was most humbled by the endearing rambles put forth by her dear friend and esteemed academic Prof. Ronald Crunkle who said many a wise word about 'wegional life' and the arts as well as a particular breed of Australianness.

 Prof. Crunkle toasts Virginias at Spin Cycle Opening

Virginia has instructed us to post some images here if you haven't yet managed to or can't get to the Bunbury Regional Art Galleries to see the show. One of the most incredible aspects of the installation is the distinctive aroma of the 3rd drawer down. Known to tea towel users the world over; that familiar faint smell of laundered linen mixed with fetid fat particles welded to the fibres of the fabric and emanating forth a most unusually familiar smell of housework. The smell of household groundhog day subltly permates the exhibition space as a result of the many donated teatowels rendered into artworks and strung from a criss-cross of clothesline throughout the space.

 Opening Legs

Another wonderful aspect to the installation is the intimacy it affords the audience. The criss-cross clothesline works to create a multitude of 'rooms' locking the viewer into a small and intimate space - literally four 'walls' of teatowels. One has to negotiate their way through the space by parting the teatowel 'curtains' to enter into the next space, and so on. Each teatowel 'room' is approximately 4 - 5 teatowels wide and 2 - 3 teatowels deep so it creates a lovely disruption to the stranger-in-the-gallery syndrome. One is immediately compelled to communicate with the person already occupying the space you have just slipped yourself into because the space is so intimate and cloistered. The only way you can find the rest of your party is to identify their feet or legs and negotiate the tea towels to arrive at their space. Beautiful. 

This installation challenged the traditional notion of the exhibiton opening as a social networking party - there was no way of seeing the whole at any one time as you found yourself completely immersed, people were absorbed and lost in the space, identifiable only by their legs or feet. There became a 'hide and seek' aspect as people would suddenly discover someone they knew in the adjoining tea towel corral.

The Entrance to the Installation

Indeed, the proximity and cloistered spaces claims a territory impossible to explain to anyone without firsthand experience - that of the suffocating entrapment of the house and neverending housework. The two rooms evoke a sense of claustrophobia as one attempts to navigate through, hoping to come across a larger space for a breath only to discover space after space of tea towel rooms almost the same as the last, yet with subtle differences - the teatowels themselves.

It is impossible to capture in stills - or even on film - the impact of Virginia's most awesome cunning stunt yet. It is an adventure to be experiencd first hand. Virginia has decided to travel the show, perhaps Perth for now - she is still 'in talks' with herself about this prospect at some stage in the near future.

 

 Tea Towel VideoWork on floor of second room (and avid audience)

ABC Southwest has been following Virginia's story and posted a video of the Virginia's at work in Hath's Mullalyup studio. This can be seen here if you are interested.

Still to come - Virginia's floor talk...stay tuned, ever faithful...

The Eyes have It

Purple Bra, Blue Stocking
(Ode to Breast Cancer Awareness)

Oh Capt Bunbury, how fair thou art!
Tis but a perfect improvement
O'er such a dis-male sight
Should you breach such sweet caress
by sudden shifting torn abreast
I'll mourn a million thousand deaths
That your feminine be wretched yet

In case you esteemed and accomplished poets out there were wondering - no, it is not any attempt to be anything other than a bunch of words. Despite a brief brush with English teaching, Ginny spouts sonnet-less verse so don't bother counting pentameters, lines or rhyming couplets lest you desire to frustrate yourself beyond all comprehension. Beauty is in the beholder of random free-verse.

Virginia does know a thing or two about a granny guerrilla cunning stunt - it is as much a performance in the installation as the finished result itself. She is quite brazen these days, flashing her wares to all and sundry in the main. Virginia is no shrinking violet, she has a story to share and there's some fun to be had in the margins.

In true Sherwood Forest-style Ginny adds a splash of domesticity to the streetscape. She assures us it's okay but something about the wanted poster style of it and rough and ready print tells us that maybe it's not really all right...

And still flies almost a year later, sewn to the tree (hanging to the left - the 'n' visible). Hanging tea towels out to weather seems to be a fitting way to savour anti-washing sentiments. How are you with your washing? Shame the clothesline at home isn't artwork for the gallery too - sometimes the washing can hang on it for weeks at a time before it is invited inside to be sorted, folded and stowed...home style installations for an audience of one? two? Perhaps more ephemeral art of the daily/weekly/monthly variety. Bit like the home cappuccino machine or the plasma TV in a home threatre - we can have our visual pleasures at home like 'the real thing' of the cinema... Now we can also have high art - ephemeral installation art at that - at home whenever we like. Just pop out back to gaze at the incredible wonder of the hills hoist. Luxury in our own back yards. How's the serenity?

Media Whore

It's official, Virginia will put it out anywhere anyhow. Check Ginny out on the ABC website (click on ABC) to see Sharon Kennedy's savvy snaps of Ginny's minions at work in the studio at Mullalyup. Also included is a meandering drone by Naomie about her inspiration for Spin Cycle. Listen carefully for in amongst the ambient sound is the occasional squirt of the ironing spray - lovely!

Also recent Cunning Stunt by Virginia (our resident Granny Guerrilla) delivered a purple sparkly bra to the Maidens of Bunbury (Rusty Sheridan's creations) in support of Breast Cancer awareness. Featured briefly on GWN news, the Maidens were treated to a modesty-makeover concealing her bare nipples with the mere suggestion of a sparkler in honour of purple bra day on Friday June 18, 2010.

As you can see - hard at work we measure up the Maidens for their modesty-enhancement makeover. A final floral embellishment was just the touch.

Slit Slot Slat

This slit is unzipped. Does this make it a slot? Virginia brings out the best and worst in us all by highlighting the hidden... A dirty old worn teatowel has been used and abused yet retains something of it's pastel pink purity making it seem vulnerable and slight, in need of protection and nurturing. Or should she be able to be dirty and pure at the same time? Is it a physicality that determines this? Tony Abbott says we must bring back the chastity belt for our fillettes. Are our boys not worthy of such attention to their developing sexuality?

this slit is zippered. You may not be able to read but the text adorned by floral buttons says 'cuisine'. Something keeps reappearing lately, a theme that suggests the humble teatowel may be occasionally gendered. Orifices of various types have been appearing in old and new teatowels alike suggesting that the orifice may have something to do with the domestic zones...the souvenir trade...or cultural positioning....could this be possible?

Tea Towel Makeover - 10 years Younger in 10 Days!!!!

Yes, it actually seems as though Ginny might be getting somewhere ('something's really happening Reg!' - Monty Python's Life of Brian) as the production cycle moves into full creative swing. Juices are flowing as the teatowels fly thick and fast, ever more brave and adventurous paving a new life, a new incarnation for the teatowel as you once though you knew her to be. She might wipe, clean, polish and rub - but she is also precious, occasionally broken, thin or layered by her experience - bearing her history on her sleeve (if she had a sleeve, Naomie thinks it would be a lacy red one).

D

DO NOT IRON

Printing is almost done (sighs of relief heaved all round, as you see, Virginia discovered the print process is far too anal and tight for our messy creativity, hence creative/painterly prints...). Virginia is now finding her true creative forte moving to the fore: collage, applique, patchwork, layering, assemblage, stitching, ripping and adorning anything that bears the remotest resemblance to a teatowel from a previous incarnation.

Layering begins in earnest as we each scrounge our studio hoardes for embellishments called for by a certain aura emmitted by each teatowel.  We have all found a strong preference for teatowels with a past life, especially stained and loved beyond recognition. The smell is most treasured by Jean who has cunning ideas about conjuring old Sunday roast smells from the kitchen to infuse the works.

Fresh talks emerge with each gathering about video possibilities. If you know a Virginia you may well be victim of her latest cunning stunt to secure your teatowel saga (or third drawer down philosophy as it may well be) on film for the exhibition. 15 minutes of fame awaits you...or your teatowels.

Helen has been working like a madwoman in the attic scratching at the yellowed wallpaper to finish her quota before she is seconded to a remote North West community school as artist in residence over May. And we, envious Ginny's, shivver away in the chilly south in time with the linglingling of our sewing machines attaching teatowels.

LingLingLingLingLin Ling ling ling...ling

Studio Shots from Hel

Thought you might like that title Hele, given our recent conversation about why your name shouldn't be shortened and in light of your recent blog troubles.

Here are the images from Hel: Some of our teatowels on our studio line-up, lovingly adorned with all manner of artistic embellishment or intervention...

Those luscious lips belong to Clifton Bieundurry, a souvenir teatowel from a NOMAD (click on link to see) exhibition dinner in New York. The photograph was taken of Cliffy by photographer Russell James. In the Nomad exhibition Cliffy imparts a layer of traditional Bieundurry-style Kimberley dot painting over Rusty's photographs on a massive scale. On the teatowel, Virginia - so inspired by Mr Bieundurry - has domesticated Cliffy's dots (interpreted here as buttons) forming the word 'c l e a n s e' in historical reference to ugly past policies brushed under the carpet. Not to forget the role of the teatowel - wet, dry, wet, dry =  cleanliness is next to Godliness!

FROM THE V.C. ARCHIVES: Here you can see a sample of  Leonardo DaVinci's Vitruvian Man Virginia Da Cunningham's Vitruvian Bratz doll sacred tea towel manuscript. Naturally she is in absolute perfect proportion - no feet to run away, massive head to hold such intellectual ponderings as what one might wear to the mall tomorrow (what else is there to ponder in life????) AND not to mention the zones of special importance neatly squared away for future slut-virginity fetishizers. NOTE: she is neatly encapsulated (one might say 'packaged') in the egg, ready to hatch fully formed and is celebrated in accompanying mirror-left script to the chorus of our staunch radical feminist lady Gaga 'I wanna take a ride on your disco stick'.

Germaine Greer would be proud of this Female Eunuch. Virginia thinks it is quite a spectacularly cunning stunt disguised as 'empowerment' especially since this limited edition archival tea towel manuscript is used in the rare and sacred ritual of dish-wiping.

It didn't!!!

Where oh where is the photo uploading symbol? Is there anyone out there who can tell me. I have photos waiting to go and no where to send them!

UP LOADING PICTURES

Why does everything to do with computer technology have to be so difficult with a 60 year old brain!! I can't see the photo symbol on my toolbar! Perhaps if I post then it will appear???????????????????????????

TEAT OWLING

I heard a really lousy joke the other day and I think I will treat you all to it.
here goes:

WHAT IS THE MOST COMMON OWL IN AUSTRALIA?

THE TEAT (OWL)

he he he he he......................told you it was lousy!


My teat owls are coming along quite quickly now. I have finished 33 of my (100) share of Virginia's 300. It is quite challenging doing 100 small art works in such a short time and also a challenge working on the other virginia's designs. With my own I know where I am coming from (then again, not always) but with the others my brain has to travel to distant places not known before. Always tricky!!

I am a virgin Virginia Blogger

My first Blog!!! Hip hip hooray - at last another Virginia gets her act together and does a post!!

The tea towels are rolling in and a big thankyou to everyone who has donated their family heirlooms, dusters, scraps from the bottom of the linen cupboard as well as the carefully saved souvenirs.

I am off on the Awesome Arts Residency Challenge late May and early June. It's Leonora this year and my fellow artist is a young man from NSW. All of this means of course that most of my 100 share of Virginia's teatowels will have to be completed before I go!! Yikes, the heat is on and I am sewing, printing, embellishing, embroidering and sewing the found objects just as fast as I can.

Better get back to it!
Helen

SPIN CYCLE MANIFESTO

Some of you may not be aware of Virginia's intention for the BRAG Showcase exhibition this July so here is the manifesto that guides us:


SPIN CYCLE

(INSTALLATION & PERFORMANCE)

Pre-wash
Wet
Dry


Pre-wash

The Tea Towel is forever in a spin. Wet. Dry. Wet. Dry. Wet… Always rubbing and polishing, shining and wiping, busy servicing our needs. Greetings from SANDFIRE ROADHOUSE. Often gifted out to friend and family as a ‘great time’ souvenir, the resilient Tea Towel is caught in a cycle, trapped in the machinations of the machine, tangled with the tights, slapped taught then hung out to dry.

The Souvenir Tea Towel, related to the common variety Tea Towel, is the rarer and more desirable form within the Tea Towel genus. Her plumage is gaudy and cheaply printed with pictures and anecdotes of a conquering past. WITTENOOM W.A. Caught in a game of Captain Cook she is bought and sold, given and received as a flag-type symbol of ‘we was here’ reinforcing the colonization cycle: Wet; dry; wet…

The Great Australian Roadhouse; small-town general store; tourist bureau; Wombat Lodge or your altruistic fundraising charity distribution chain (CWA, P&C) are the preferred habitat for the Souvenir Tea Towel. She is desired by the panicked traveler sans imagination, the sensible shoe brigade and the astute collector oblivious to the inherent values embedded in the object itself and it’s covering decoration. CARNARVON WA jostles for provenance with MADE IN CHINA.

The Tea Towel ends up on the line. She is hoisted up dripping and bleached by the Australian sun until rigid. Pulled down she is roughly folded then jammed third drawer down on top of the Souvenir Tea Towel. Too good to use and too sentimental to throw away, she languishes nibbled by silverfish until recycled by the local Red Cross. I swam with the dolphins at BUNBURY WA.



Wet

An examination of the production and use of the Souvenir Tea Towel will be the focus of exploration for this exhibition. It will be examined as a metaphor for and symbol of culture, society and the individual.

The Tea Towel is a signifier of our colonial past and an icon of colonial conquest. The origins of tea and ‘tea time’ rituals indeed come into question here as loaded meanings inherent in the Tea Towel itself. These will be explored further in the exhibition.

In addition the Tea Towel is stamped and marked with other meanings creating a layered effect, like culture over culture. This will be interrogated in the creation of a new range of Tea Towels which will be produced (BUNBURY,WA); gifted (we was here); used (wet, dry, wet…) and recycled into exhibition (spin cycle).

Dry

The exhibition is cyclic in nature and will constantly change.

The audience will encounter a quiet, still laundry room caught mid-cycle. Tea Towels were laundered on washing day. They now hang, filling the space; a moist, laundered scent mixed with the fetid odour of a thousand roast dinners will fill the space. Piles of tea towels are strewn on the floor.

Several days later, the tea towels are miraculously transformed. They are folded, crisp and dry. They are ironed in-situ once a week as part of the laundry cycle, a performance element of the installation.

The fresh Tea Towels are sent out for use as the next batch arrives to be strung up. This installation is designed to evolve to emphasise the cycle of production and use; supply and demand; wet and dry. Laundry is always getting done yet is never actually done.

The audience will notice that each Tea Towel is a unique response to the multiple meanings embedded in the Souvenir Tea-Towel (see pre wash, above) and how this layering reflects a false sense of Australian culture.


Spin Cycle reminds us to look closely at those things we take for granted and have forgotten to see.

It is a reflection of the false values we allow into our homes stamped on a tea towel that become normalized and overlooked over time.

The performance element of the exhibition emphasizes the endless Groundhog Day of daily ongoing rituals that give meaning but in themselves become meaningless. Silent endeavour.

The installation will be a unique “creeping” style exhibition where the viewer experiences a different exhibition each time they visit.

This exhibition promises to reach beyond the realm of the typical exhibition experience in the South West in that it will be a large-scale conceptual installation. These types of exhibitions are rare – even in Perth – and establish a sense of art as beyond the object or the process itself encouraging discussion and debate.

Climbing the BRAG Summit

Helen and Naomie participated in the Summit held at the Bunbury Regional Art Galleries on Saturday.

Interesting to hear David Bromfield and Pippa Tandy's approach to selecting works for the 2010 survey. The set about subscribing a meta-narrative to the studio visit process and resulting exhibition to speak of  how a sense of place infuses each individual artist's practice thereby creating a unifying whole. At least a whole for a sensible critique of a collection of works.

In many ways the artists of the south west region are no different from most other areas in that it can be a bit like herding cats without a central narrative core of focus to drive or dispel artistic purpose. For this reason one felt that any overarching theme applied to artists of this region extremely hazardous. There is no doubt, from a writer's point of view that to generalise or link commonalities across practice presents a nice package to write around and perspective to critique from. 'Tis our human nature to want to categorise and generalise to make sense of experience so one cannot be too harsh - perhaps the sheer diversity of the region has more to do with artist background, time lived in the region and purpose for being here... but one quibbles statistical analysis, not necessarily the purpose? 

I wonder how the results would differ had P & D the opportunity to do similar projects in other areas?

Nevertheless, opportunity to exhibit, connection with other artists, organised networking and critical writing were the general themes that seemed to present themselves as much-needed in our area. (no longer is it kosher to be a 'regional artist' or a 'south west artist' - apparently these terms are somewhat prescriptive and limiting... the play with semantics continues... you may consider us artists from the south west or living in a regional context however)  Some great ideas were tossed about in the south west artist salad, oh, excuse moi, the salad tossed by the artists who happen to live in the south west but may not necessarily be south west artists! haha ha! Anyone seen MOnty Python lately?

More on tea towel production next...

looking through a pickle-tinged Fowler's vacola

It's not a rosy glow, it's a soft warm light emitted through a pickled-tinged lens. That pretty much sums up how we are all feeling having screen printed printed more than our first third of the souvenir tea towel quota ready for INTERVENTION...(where we pass on the prints for one another to add/change/modify etc - Virginia's special 'touch'.)

Surprises will no doubt be in store as we meet again to share our quiet labours  from our individual studios...what will Virginia inspire each of us to do? How will the intervention/embellishment of one another's tea towel masterpiece turn out? Only Virginia knows. Surprises in store.

We each have a unique take on the cultural souvenir trade: from the halcyon daze of a romance-infused domestic drudgery of a bygone era (really? not still today?? stranger echoes have resounded...) to the culling of our national emblem - such a proud country, we harvest our national icon - and the colonial quest for civility & decency read between the lines of recipes, dancing or home management. The tea towel never strays far from it's sweaty purpose to mop up after a big feast.

The real joy, for us three musky-tears, lies in the discussion and artistic exchange surrounding Virginia. Ginny brings us together to share and discuss, inspire and challenge. Ideas are threshed out and interrogated until we satisfy a shared understanding. Three creative minds are definitely better than one.

The Three Musky Tears

Welcome to the new Monday post as we approach exhibition July 30th. In an effort to be communicative we plan to write weekly posts for Ginny to count down the weeks of work until D-Day.

Virginia called us in for our second week of screening yesterday. Much relief now that the gut-wrenching grant writing process is behind us... We three have been awaiting this moment with baited breath: to throw ourselves into the process of printing teatowels for the upcoming exhibition.

We each have 100 works to prepare for Ginny's exhibition; the first stage is to madly screen-print our basic designs that we will pass around the campfire for additional embellishments or interventions over the coming months leading up to D-Day at the end of June.

We had planned to sew the 300 teatowels our loving selves - haha hahaha! After countless hours of sweatshop labour cutting, ripping, stitching, steaming and ironing ourselves into tomorrow we realised Virginia had been slightly ambitious with all her positive thinking and penny-pinching when we meditated upon the results: a meagre pile of 32 neat and tidy teatowels.

If we stitched for a week solid we might actually arrive at 300. Interesting as Ginny pointed out this little exercise adds another symbolic dimension to the 'cultural layering' at the core of her souvenir tea towel show - the teatowel sourced in India, printed in China and sold in Carnarvon as a token souvenir of one's adventures (inasmuch as 'adventures' and 'Carnarvon' may seem uneasy bedfellows to some) taken home to dry and be washed, dry and be washed, dry and be washed until holy. The cyclic layers of unseen work that forms our daily existence influences who we are in silent ways of blind acceptance; Virginia worships this holiness.

Taking this into account we have bulk-purchased teatowels (made in India) to compliment our natty little pile of home-crafted lovelies and the war-worn many that have been generously donated or rescued from the rag-bag. (beautifully demonstrated by Helen, below)



This gorgeous little gem is Virginia's shroud of Turin. What blessed miracles has this humble cloth witnessed? Such a relic is almost too precious to touch.

Working together we have discovered some interesting variations in work practices. We have had the occasional visit from Iris Krunkle (Helen's dear old well-meaning but absent-minded friend); we have discovered a delicious contrast in the neat, careful and ordered precision of Jean's process in stark comparison to the awe-struck horror inspired by Naomie's plunge into creative chaos where she manages by some miracle of paint to smear every surface in sight - and amazingly - including some quite well out of sight also and that Virginia likes a bit of cucumber & confessional. No, not linked. Cucumber (eat). Confessional (confess secrets, but not about cucumbers). Sorry if this disappoints.

Until next week...when Virginia intervenes

Hand Chutney...Sshh

Hand Chutney is one of Virginia's favourite accomaniments Sshh! it is a secret recipe... Virginia decorated the BRAG tree with a nursery of ornaments and mobiles to keep the invisible imagination afloat.

A little plastic bird with frigid wings

that will never feel the wind

she peers out of her distorted little world

and sees a somewhat skewed reality

that she is amongst

yet isolated from.

A desperate hand grasps the arm of the child within.

Fingers pressing deeply into fragile flesh

innocence becomes marked no more so than the mind.

wrap yourself around me long enough

and you will become a mockery

of what I appear to be to you

mother and confessional

THE CURTAIN SERIES: Mother and Confessional is Ginny's first outing as a granny guerilla back in 2008 and comprises the first line of her performance poem that will evolve over the years.

To the left if you squint, you can see two of her curtain series nailed and pasted around the Bunbury Regional Art Galleries.

Confessional detail - peek through the curtains to see her secrets revealed.

Two fleshy lips that whisper in blackness of the mother behind the parted veil.

And obscured

the bridal veil

...and...and...and...

'Tis never ending