Paul
Zika teaches at the Tasmanian School of Art in Hobart.
He exhibits at Stephen McLaughlin gallery
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Cornucopia (Santiago) 170 x
220cm |
My artistic research focus is twofold. The
studio-based outcomes are in the form of artefacts exhibited in art
galleries. I have had fourteen solo-shows in Hobart, Melbourne and
Brisbane since 1973. The other important aspect of research enquiry
is the curatorship of exhibitions. Over a twenty-year period I have
curated sixteen exhibitions of contemporary art, craft and design
for the Plimsoll Gallery at the University of Tasmania.
During the eighties this practice focused on
issues of place and identity. The site specific ‘Place of
Contemplation’ on Mt Nelson was followed by a series ‘As I gaze upon
the mountain’ which reflected upon current debates on land rights and
Asian immigration. Two important concurrent curatorial projects were
‘A Place of Contemplation: architectural attitudes to space’ and
‘Outgrowing Assimilation?’
Over the last ten years I have been researching
even more radical spatial scenarios in painting through a
re-interpretation of elaborate décor and the audacious interplay
within highly ornamental architectural scenographies. I have employed
an eclectic assortment of fragments of Baroque, Rococo, and Spanish
Art Nouveau decorative systems in this research.
My parents were refugees from post-war
Czechoslovakia. After time in an Austrian transit camp they were
granted entry to Australia (The final destination was a ‘lottery’,
having applied to Brazil, Canada and Australia). I was born in Albury
two months after their arrival at Bonegilla Migrant Camp. The Russell
Family greatly assisted my parents as ‘new Australians’ and became my
godparents.
My father became a designer of stained glass
windows and other decorative art objects. The parish priest of the
Anglican Church of St James the Great in East St. Kilda became an
important patron and over fifteen years my father completed a series
of commissions for the church. The attribute of St James is a shell.
For many refugees seeking a new life, there are
severe limitations on possessions they can carry. Lace and other
highly decorative materials are often the only vestige of a previous
place/life taken to the new haven. What began as a simple keepsake
takes on a resonance of association over time. A seemingly innocent
pattern becomes a claustrophobic web. While the ‘rocaille’ encloses
and contains, we lose track of its form - we are suspended in an
undelineated space.
The work is dedicated to Heda Schaefer (my
mother) and Eileen Russell (my godmother)
Paul Zika 2002
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