Kate Bohunnis' fabrications and frustrations

Kate Bohunnis is an artist based in Adelaide/Kaurna Yarta, working in metal, mold-making, textiles, print and sound.

Bohunnis holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts and Design from Adelaide College of the Arts; and attained her Honours, Creative Arts, Visual Arts from Flinders University. She was awarded the Eran Svigos Award for Best Visual Art; South Australian Graduate Award; David Hayden Professional Development Award; Watson Award; and the Arts Excellence in Printmaking Award.  She has received project grants from Helpmann Academy and Adelaide Fringe and has undertaken various national and international arts residencies. Bohunnis has exhibited at BLINDSIDE, Melbourne; Praxis ARTSPACE, FELTspace, Sister Gallery, and Holy Rollers, Adelaide; Perth Institute of Contemporary Art (PICA); and various group exhibitions throughout South Australia. She will soon exhibit in the 2020 South Australian Artist Survey at ACE Open, Adelaide.

Interview by Hannah Jenkins, Co-Director, Firstdraft.

Hannah Jenkins: Your work is about gendered material – in the sense that the physical materiality of something can have particular traits associated with gendered attributes, but also in the sense that many materials have gendered applications in society – can you elaborate on these ideas?

Kate Bohunnis: Yes, for me it is not necessarily that a material is gendered, but perhaps that the sets of knowledge, physical relationships and sensibilities between the body and the methods of making still hold traditionally gendered stereotypes. Working between metal fabrication and textiles, I was disappointed to find that this stereotypical perspective of how particular bodies can and should interact with a material in relation to their own physical capabilities was determined by their gender. There are limits imposed before the process has even begun. Of course, this perspective can be altered, but it comes down to a determined effort on an individual basis. 

Aside from this, there are the broader associations to the materials I use, such as metal and infrastructure/industry and textiles and domesticity. Again, this is reductive and not representational of the uses and potentials within each.

Kate Bohunnis. Photo: Eleanor Amore.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail), Firstdraft. Photo: Jessica Maurer. Courtesy the artist.

“I feel frustrated that although I don’t subscribe to these stereotypes of gender, sexuality and people’s need to see it demonstrated in a familiar performance or framework, the effects of it are insidious and even in resistance I question how I am unknowingly participating.”

HJ: Heather Davis gave an excellent presentation a few years back about the queer futurity of plastic as a material. Can a material be intrinsically queer? Or, as perhaps your installations suggest, does this queerness come from the ways in which we use and present them – challenging established rules about the performance of gender through subversive experimentation and form?

KB: When Heather Davis speaks of the molecular structure of plastic, stating that “plastic wants to hold onto its identity against all outside influence”, it is this resistance to succumbing to the influences of a perceived “normality”; there be it in this case a predominantly white, heterosexual cis male understanding of one’s environment that begets queerness. The way that I explore queerness in my work is in the relationship between materials, such as the integration of soft and hard and their associations. And then subverting these associations by inverting their structural integrity or dominance, whilst often introducing new materials broadly associated with kink wear and play.

I feel frustrated that although I don’t subscribe to these stereotypes of gender, sexuality and people’s need to see it demonstrated in a familiar performance or framework, the effects of it are insidious and even in resistance I question how I am unknowingly participating.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail), Firstdraft. Photo: Jessica Maurer. Courtesy the artist.

“Sometimes this anthropomorphism is found in a gesture or a collapse, determined by the environment they are situated in. Demonstrating the confines of the room, and then more broadly, the society in which we live.”

HJ: I see your installation elements as almost anthropomorphic – proxy for individuals who are subverting expectation and challenging traditional identities – is this your intention?

KB: It is certainly more present in some of my work than others, but I would say that this feeling of anthropomorphism is evident in differing ways throughout. In the case of this soft machine, I have tested the boundaries of some materials, subverting or challenging their structural integrity, or built relationships between them that provoke a new material tension or expectation.

Sometimes this anthropomorphism is found in a gesture or a collapse, determined by the environment they are situated in. Demonstrating the confines of the room, and then more broadly, the society in which we live.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail), Firstdraft. Photo: Jessica Maurer. Courtesy the artist.

HJ: In regards to your process and practice, can you tell me more about how these works have been made?

KB: I have made all of the stainless steel work using basic metal fabrication processes of using the forge, rolling, welding and polishing. The textile works in this soft machine I have hand sewn. 

Although the material properties are obviously greatly different, I approach both the textiles and metal in a similar manner. Being new to working with either, it offers me the freedom to experiment and play with each. Generally, I will consider a feeling and begin to manipulate the material in response. For me it is important to maintain an experimental approach, almost finding a balance between knowing too much or too little. Where possible I like to find my own way, sidestepping traditional teachings or methods to encounter freedom.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail). Photo: Sam Roberts. Courtesy the artist.

“Where possible I like to find my own way, sidestepping traditional teachings or methods to encounter freedom.”

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail). Photo: Sam Roberts. Courtesy the artist.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail). Photo: Sam Roberts. Courtesy the artist.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail), Firstdraft. Photo: Jessica Maurer. Courtesy the artist.

“... I was appalled to find how people... responded to me as a queer woman working in fabrication and sculpture.”

HJ: Is this a continuation of your artistic practice or something new for you? How did these specific ideas come to be?

KB: I majored in printmaking in my bachelor degree. It was whilst completing my honours that I began looking into ideas surrounding productive destabilisation and uncertainty through the works of Gilles Deleuze, Brian Massumi, Simon O’Sullivan and Elizabeth Grosz. It was in considering an improvisational method of enacting agency in my personal life and psychological frameworks, that I realised the importance directing it outward in my professional practice too. Turning away from the orthodoxies of one medium, I began experimenting with sculpture, sound and textiles. Adopting an intuitive, experimental approach with an openness to all material engagement.

The ideas that are specific to this soft machine were developed over time after feeling frustrated and disappointed in the tired stereotypes I encountered that are associated with both mediums. I often work casually as a metal fabricator in my studio and although the community is supportive there, I was appalled to find how people within the industry responded to me as a queer woman working in fabrication and sculpture.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail). Photo: Sam Roberts. Courtesy the artist.

“... anxiety about the future does not necessarily predicate a fertile ground for making...”

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail), Firstdraft. Photo: Jessica Maurer. Courtesy the artist.

HJ: What do you hope visitors to Firstdraft will feel and consider when standing in your exhibition?

KB: I hope that visitors will feel an opportunity to consider their own network of supportive and destructive systems and how they respond to them. I think this is vital when considering the communities that we choose to live in. We must remain keenly aware of what we absorb and what we expel. It is easy to find safety in our bubbles, but rarely productive internally or externally.

HJ: How has this year been for you? How has your lifestyle and artmaking been affected by 2020?

KB: Living in South Australia, we have been very fortunate with the state of COVID-19. I have felt incredibly lucky that many of my projects this year have been able to go ahead. Perhaps with some changes in programming, but still making it into the gallery. Of course, anxiety about the future does not necessarily predicate a fertile ground for making and senseless explorations, but being forced to adapt and push forward is always strengthening in the long run.

Kate Bohunnis, this soft machine, 2020, stainless steel, latex, velvet, faux fur, chiffon, cotton thread, dimensions variable, installation view (detail), Firstdraft. Photo: Jessica Maurer. Courtesy the artist.

HJ: Where to next? What projects and plans do you have for the immediate and longer future?

GK: My interests at the moment are to continue making sculptural installations in new ways and seeking opportunities and relationships with communities nationally and internationally. Of course, these are somewhat difficult intentions to hold with the state of things at the moment. So to begin I will focus on being patient and considered.

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