Amanda Bennetts, I feel the weight of the minute as I bend my body towards the clock, 2023, Multimedia installation, QCA Galleries, Brisbane. Photo: Louis Lim

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I feel the weight of the minute as I bend my body towards the clock

Amanda Bennetts

@amanda_bennetts | amandabennetts.art

Roomsheet

I feel the weight of the minute as I bend my body towards the clock is a multimedia installation examining time and the labour of self-care for the disabled and ill body. In a society that centralises wellness as the default mode of existence, sickness is placed as temporary, an abhorrent to the norm. Through its use of medical, sanatorium, spa, and disability aesthetics, the installation dissects how time for the non-normative bodies is bent, stretched, slowed, rewound, expanded, and fastened. The rationing of energy, due dates, the time taken to perform a specific task, working hours, ideal hours of sleep that a body needs, etc., are largely normative and fixed in nature. Rather than society bending the clock to meet the ill and disabled bodies, many with detrimental effects bend their bodies to meet the clock. While the sculptural works within the installation involve found objects that should serve the body at rest, the body well, the body at ease - each speaks instead to the body afflicted. Forming a space where tension and balance precariously coexist, inviting a deeper conversation about the intricate realities of living with illness and disability.