COMBINE
COMBINE
Janet Burchill, Jennifer McCamley, Melinda Harper
27 October - 24 February 2008
Venue: Heide II
Curator: Kendrah Morgan
Tapestry plan 2006
collage, colour pencil on paper
Courtesy the artists and Anna Schwartz Gallery, Melbourne
© Janet Burchill and Jennifer McCamley
The exhibition title COMBINE derives from American artist Robert Rauschenberg's use of this term to describe his radical assemblages of painted images, found objects and other artists’ works in the 1950s. This concept provided the loose generative framework for Janet Burchill, Jennifer McCamley and Melinda Harper’s self-curated project in Heide II, the modernist house designed in 1963–64 by David McGlashan of McGlashan and Everist.
The internal architecture of the space is treated as an armature supporting a remarkable range of works; from screenprints and paintings to hybridised furniture and a neon sculpture. The exhibition culminates in a monumental experimental ‘tapestry’ incorporating elements by all three artists. Burchill, McCamley and Harper also integrate the work of ‘guest artists’ Ethel Barnes (b.1876; d. 1980), Erica McGilchrist (b. 1926) and A D S Donaldson (b. 1961) into combinations of their own works and the project as a whole.
