Hannah-Kate Proctor
Belmont Christian College
DETACHMENT FROM HER ORIGIN
Sculpture
Epoxy resin, timber, cast bronze, concrete
Many people have to leave their home country and live in a culture completely foreign to them. This is the concept behind my body of work, but it was a difficult concept to physically represent. I had to experiment with different ideas to find the right balance of emotional depth and familiarise the audience with the reality that such people face. The range of difficulties that I experienced include: bubbles in the epoxy resin; creating a clay mould for the concrete; the bronzing of the tiny woman as it was such a small object to bronze; using the laser cutter to print the maps.
My artmaking practice has been influenced by the study and interpretation of the artist Ben Young.
Marker's Commentary
Detachment from Her Origin explores the diaspora of family and the realities of negotiating a new life and alien culture. This Body of Work is assembled from four parts to create a single curated sculpture, incorporating the presentation of the plinth replicating a similarity to historical artifacts located in a museum. The work’s monumental sense of scale and distance is reinforced by the placement of the tiny, bronzed faceless female, the single link of humanity on the rocky shoreline. This Body of Work successfully integrates a range of materials highlighted by the striking blue resin waterway in carefully mapped geography housed in the box-like construction. Contemplative in its simplicity, the amalgamation of the material elements of wood, concrete, bronze and resin into refined surface forms reinforce the inviting and engaging nature of the sculpture. Laser cut mapping disclosures the conceptual relevance about stories of migration and global journeys of people to new homelands.
