Custom Artwork for the Gray Community Hall
March 30, 2022

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Artist statement for 'Fleeting' by Joanna del Nido

‘Fleeting’: a site-specific artwork for the new Gray Community Hall inspired by the surrounding gardens of the Harvest Corner Community Garden.

Gardens are a place of continual change - of growth, light, seasons and the memories of time spent in them, time spent nurturing plants, observing growth and wildlife, weather and fluctuating light. The concept ‘Fleeting’ is inspired by these continual changes and aims to evoke them by providing ‘in focus’ and ‘out of focus’ views of garden details.

As a site-specific work the plants represented are currently on-site or well recognised in Darwin. These plants are ixora, fiddlewood and bougainvillea.

Colorful glass art installation in a building with high ceilings and large windows; vibrant hues of red, orange, and green.
Glass entryway with a colorful glass sculpture hanging from the ceiling. Green, orange, and blue hues.

The new Community Hall is contemporary and features a large glass façade. It is important that the artwork should appear light and colourful and complement the site. The work will have many viewing points from both inside and outside the building and aims to directly link the two elements.

Each viewer will have a different view which will change as they move beneath the artwork, thus offering a ‘fleeting’ view of the work. The work features a number of elements hung in a series of layers, and these appear as floating coloured organic shapes. Some of the abstract suspended shapes will align when the viewer stands at certain points underneath the work, and this will reveal an in-focus floral cluster. As the viewer moves under the work another cluster will reveal itself while the others appear to visually separate.

A colorful, suspended floral sculpture hangs in a bright gallery space with large windows.

Constructed from durable powder-coated perforated aluminium, aluminium sheets, and Perspex details, the suspended artwork will appear light, and to float in the space. The perforations will appear to provide a soft dappled light and, importantly, will enable light to still pass through the building.

The perforations, when layered, will create a moiré effect and the interference pattern thus created will give the illusion of flickering movement. The layering of these perforated sheets also aids in visually mixing the colours and gives an illusion of depth, besides substantially reducing the weight of the artwork.

The artwork will be lit with a custom-designed central hanging light fixture which will project up underneath the work and enhance the vibrant powder-coated colours and cast intricate shadows onto pieces of the artwork and the ceiling above.

Empty hall with wood floor, large glass doors, and abstract ceiling art.
Large, empty hall with wooden floor, glass walls, and colorful ceiling art.

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