Parallel Visions is an exhibition exploring the ephemeral nature of looking. Andrew Weatherill, Bambi Johnson and Giordano Biondi
5 May – 29 July 2017, Mailbox Art Space, 141-143 Flinders Lane, Melbourne.
Out of the matrix / Suzanne Davies; Richard Harding; Melbourne, Victoria RMIT Gallery, 2016.
Arts writer - contributor to Artist Profile Fifth Anniversary Issue
Kristin Tennyson Story Andrew Weatherill
Artist Profile magazine Issue 20, 2012, pp. 52-55
Intersections
A project by Andrew Weatherill
 
Words can deceive and ‘project’ is indeed a deceitful word in that it implies something attempted, but not achieved. An exhibition, hinting at something that is final and complete, would convey more substance. Still Andrew’s exhibition in Tartu is not a Ding an sich, but a constellation that manifested in a larger framework. It was not finished, it never will, and just as it was born out of intersections, it will stay alive by intersecting with objects, ideas and observers. At least such is my hope and with this in mind, I want to describe a few of the layers that contribute to Andrew’s project during his winter residency in Tartu, Estonia.
 
If words are deceitful, then printing is the vehicle of deception. It is maybe because of the potential to lose oneself in word games, that Andrew has a very minimalist, even somewhat suprematist approach to printing. The time line back to Malevich could not be clearer and a disproportionately large body of Andrew's prints are fundamental basic shapes – triangles, circles, squares. Included in the title is an interaction between these shapes and this is probably the foundation layer to Andrew’s work. Take it with a protractor and enjoy the angles while you can — the setup for any exhibition is site-specific for Andrew and the choice, position and clustering of works is heavily influenced by the space.
 
The intersections still go further. If you look inside the shapes, you will find chaos as only copper can conjure it. Etching is more often than not a stochastic process, where corrosive agents meet the polished surface of a metal plate. Outside of laboratory conditions this is never a definite process and for printmakers this can be a huge boon as well as a bane. Andrew basked in imperfections of the process and even multiplied them, literally, by placing a work under a magnifying glass. The choice of copper plate also supported a non-deterministic outcome, as the material was donated scrap from a local roofing company, and carried the scrapes and scratches of the trade. To make matters worse, the printing technique was sometimes reversed and etching was sometimes used for relief printing. This is not unknown, but not often practiced in the way that Andrew does it, to add emphasis, highlight, or mostly — shape to his prints.
 
Yet another – and for the hosts to this project, also one of the more tangible layers in this project, was how Andrew captured the cityscape of my native Tartu. Having had the honor of hosting four different printmakers from Australia in our program, I can now say with some confidence, that there is something in Tartu that only an Australian can properly put their finger on. The city’s residential areas have a lot of wooden housing and the parallel lines of cladding plus the stochastic patterns of peeling paint and weathered timber are, in essence, a livable version of Andrew’s prints. All in all, it takes the vision of an Australian printmaker to discover that the city literally has shapes printed on the houses that we’ve walked past daily and never noticed. And this for me was the biggest epiphany to see the architecture of my city revealed in Andrew’s prints. Wooden houses to paper, that is the final layer for this constellation.
 
Lemmit Kaplinski
Studio.Tartuensis, founder and manager of Tartu's Estonian Printing Museum

Sepik home      coming

The big men sent the boys       home
       back
              back down       the long track,
to the brown serpent of the Sepik.
Away from the Wewak Wild West
       away       from corruption
              from colonialism
       away       from confusion
              from violence.
Big men, who care       
       to protect their young
              their culture
from change
       they cannot escape.
                              ~~~
The journey back       is long.
PMV trucks jolt       down the track.
Cutting through the forest,
       dark green vegetation
       encroaches from both sides       encroaching
              impenetrable.
To trespass from the track is to be engulfed by darkness
       no left       no right
              and no sky       above.
Above the track,       blue sky stretches
       from the coast
              to the edge       of the Sepik.
Hornbills follow the gash       in the jungle
       to fishing grounds.
Huge airships       they appear
       too large
              too heavy       
              to hang       in the blue.
Broad wings       span the width       
       of the track they follow.
Like the big men, they know
       the importance       of the river
              an abundance of food
       security.
They, too, head back
       back down       
              the long track.
                              ~~~
The river is silt laden,       
       serpent brown.
Originating in the cool highlands
       it winds       down
              down       1,200 km from the central spine       
              to the coast.
Getting wider,
       small islands       torn from the bank
              rush away to the sea.
The serpent carries dugout canoes,
       small tin boats,       
              the occasional       curious tourist vessel.
Where the track ends,
       the river is       wide
              too wide to see       the opposite bank.
Tiny villages       hidden along the river’s
       swampy tributaries.
Each tribe has its own beliefs,
       people are windows into the past.
Today,     headhunting raids
       are frowned upon.
There is less       to fight about.
There is plenty       of solitude.
And an abundance       
       of fish
              of sago.
Fewer expectations,
       removed from the big men’s worries
              in Wewak Wild West.
Crossing the breadth of the river
       exposes swamp-lined jungle       
              silence.
                              ~~~
The Spirit House       in the boy’s village
       soars 25 metres,
              peeking above the forest canopy.
It provides shade       safe platform
       above the wet       the crocs.
The silver fish       glisten in lines     
       drying.
Beneath one of the houses, the boys have something     
       something special.
A pool table squats       on a dusty floor.
The reason they have agreed to come,
       a gift from the big men
              to help while away       the countless hours.
The table cannot be easily moved.
Precious pool balls,       carefully hidden
       are ready       for the next game.
The ancient culture of Papua New Guinea here,      
       is still living and changing       
              back.