Colorbond, plywood, dust. 

Megan Kennedy

Opening 09.01.19 6-8pm
Artist Talks 31.01.19 6-7pm

When I was a kid I used to sneak into my Dad’s shed. Using all the strength I had, I could wedge the corrugated roller door off the concrete to forge a gap just wide enough to slip underneath. I’d survey the collection of curious objects strewn across endless rows of dusty benches and shelves, wide-eyed at the prospect of the inventions soon to be unearthed. I’d stay in there for hours.

In Colorbond, plywood, dust. Megan Kennedy posits these visits to her Dad’s shed as formative experiences in the development of her own sculptural vocabulary. Presenting a selection of modified domestic and found materials, her installation endeavours to conduct a kind of sculptural re-examination of these backyard ventures. A slow drip from an overhead PVC pipe, a radio that endlessly scans across AM frequencies; through the act of ‘tinkering’, materials are reconfigured to animate the passing of time.

Beyond personal reflection, the exhibition seeks to delve into some of the more problematic aspects of an iconic Australian domestic structure. What could be read as a nostalgic glimpse at a middle-class white Australian upbringing, is muddied with the acknowledgment of the patriarchal and colonial lineage of the ‘Aussie shed’. A ‘man cave’, as it has been popularly referred to, represents a traditional space of male exclusivity. In Colorbond, plywood, dust. Megan uses the anecdote of this childhood experience as a means of subverting a typically masculine domain.