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february 13 - march 3

Pretty vacant

Sussi Ross

Pretty Vacant centres on the human subject watching television.   Caught in the light of the television the viewer loses all self awareness as they turn on, tune in and drop out. The subject blankly returns a vacant stare to the television proving Timothy Leary’s concept of passive reception alive and well 10 years after his death.

For the loaded content of Ross’s drawings, the figure in each image remains honest, familiar and domestic beneath the glow of the screen. Ross has captured a vacant yet concentrated expression, readily seen on any TV viewers face, yet rarely watched.

These vacant stares are captured by the artist as large scale drawings on paper using chinagraph and lithograph pencils, oil paint, pastel and graphite.

Sussi Ross graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts in 2000. She has exhibited extensively throughout Melbourne since graduating. She currently works as a courtroom portrait artist in Richmond.

A new beautiful you

Louise Gresswell

a new beautiful you neurotically inquires into society’s increasing obsession with youth, beauty and the flawless image. Louise Gresswell has mesmorisingly stitched into the painted canvas. Superficial phrases such as “one size fits all” and “a new you” weep indelibly through the paint.

Salvation through perfection can be found in the smiling faces of the clinically dressed, coiffed and perfumed consultants of department stores. However, beneath the spray and bake and the 2 kilograms of lipstick consumed in a lifetime lies a defective line of thinking. Each of Gresswell’s canvases is a made to order neurosis revealing the flaws and obsessions beneath this quest for superficial perfection.

Each heavily glossed canvas surface hangs like a mirror on the gallery wall. The viewer is left peering into the painting and staring back at themselves. It might be time for a slide past the Lancôme counter of excellence for a quick reputty and gloss…

Louise Gresswell is a full time artist living in Melbourne. She holds an honours degree from the Chelsea College of Art and Design in London. She has exhibited both internationally and locally. This is Gresswell’s second solo exhibition at red gallery.

War Games    

Anna Cameron

War Games: A Journey of Innocence is a narrative photographic exhibition. The gallery reads, from left to right, like a children’s story book.  Like many children’s games and stories, this is a gruesome tale which ends with a simple case of winners and losers. 

Games and toys are used by society to socialize its young.  It is often during a child’s ‘game’ that the innocence of childhood first meets the potential for fear and terror.  The domain in which children experience such challenges, is the area in which Anna Cameron conducts her research.

Cameron’s photographs have the feel of a war movie, but the inclusion of toy soldiers unnerves the viewer, and the addition of macabre subtitles and comments on current events adds to the discomfort.

This is Anna Camerons first solo exhibition since graduating from RMIT in 2006.