(This is the text of an address I gave on May 14th, 2016 at the Opening of Opertus, – an exhibition by members of Nebuli Arts, at Gallery Lane Cove, Sydney, Australia.)
See below for opening details of this Head On Photo Festival Associated Exhibition.

Some 192 years ago, a French inventor Joseph Nicéphore Niépce exposed a specially chemically-coated pewter plate to the light outside his window for about eight hours. By using some remarkable chemistry he fixed what his camera saw. So it was that in 1826 or 1827, the first surviving photograph was made in the lowly French village Saint-Loup-de-Varennes, in Burgundy. It followed decades of attempts to create what we know as photography.

It was not until Niépce showed the way, that others like Daguerre and Fox Talbot could follow. The rest is photographic history.

In an Australian population of 23 million people, there are more cameras in daily use than people; it’s not the special wooden box with a large brass mounted glass lens, but rather a slim diminutive electronic sensor with a plastic aspherical lens assembly, embodied in our phones. They say that today anyone can be a photographer. Actually few achieve greatness just by recording what’s in front of them. Fortunately, from the great mass of camera phone users and a sea of mediocrity, there ARE some who apply a seeing eye, who think creatively, who view the world as it is and make statements visually that reveal more than most of us see. Fact is most of us hardly even look; so perhaps it’s not surprising that we do NOT see what THESE photographers see.

In the Opertus exhibition that we are enjoying here today, we have the work of four photographers who have revealed that which is not obvious; that which may to the rest of us be obscure. In making their pictures they have startled us into seeing something, – freshly. As the invitation to this event so concisely and clearly states: “An exhibition of photographs discovering and sharing the richness of shadows and patterns in the real and in the imagined world.”

You see the work of these four people, Jan Glover, Maureen Rogers, Christoph Mueller and Des Crawley, has taken something, or somewhere, or an idea – that we could all have visited or seen. But WE didn’t. They have given us new light, new insight, new expression, new focus. They have made pictures. In doing so they follow hundreds of years of artistic expression where those who drew, or painted or sculpted or carved, or potted – artists of the then-available media, – brought to the viewer or audience, something fresh, something provocative, something that tests our perceptions of reality.

Please read the artists’ statements about their work. I won’t repeat them here, but I do urge you to read them. Each has found joy in their ability to find something that was Opertus – concealed, hidden, obscure – and make it less so, or give it new meaning – it reveals that which was hidden and is now seen.

The work comes from a broader group of image-makers, called Nebuli Arts. This is the fifth year that the group, with different combinations of artists showing each year, has participated as an Associated Exhibition within the Head-On Photo Festival. The name for this show came from someone who was originally going to be part of this show, Dawn Zandstra, another Nebuli member. And it’s thanks to a strongly supportive camera club, Northside Creative. I’d like to commend the support of Northside’s Susan Buchanan and on top of his own work, to mentor and guide, Des Crawley. Both Susan and Des must take much credit for inspiring this creative energy over many years.

Jan Glover has used the patience of a saint and the observation skills of a hawk to capture minute and fleeting moments of nature that disappear as fast as they are created. Maureen Rogers has used that wonderful dreamy Lensbaby to make common flowers into exquisite forms and tones that challenge our pre-conceptions. Christoph takes what any of us may glance at and possibly notice. He sees different forms and records his own perception, his own reality. Des extracts patterns and portraits from graffiti and reveals art within art, by adjusting tone and changing our ability, or sometimes in-ability to focus.

maureen-rogers+des-crawley+jan-glover+christoph-mueller+john-s_JDS5409

(L to R: Maureen Rogers, Des Crawley, Jan Glover, Christoph Mueller, John Swainston.)   Photo: © Charles Sutton, 2016.

Sadly we live in times where art is once again under threat as a priority in our society. We learned yesterday of the consequences of $90 million of losses to Australia Council funding. The Australian Centre for Photography here in Sydney, and the Centre for Contemporary Photography (CCP) in Melbourne, are no longer on the Australia Council’s funding lists.

Indeed, Some 48 other leading arts organizations have also seen funds cut or ended. What does THIS reveal about us as a society? Do we just accept it and tighten our belts and man-up? Art has always had to fight. Opertus reveals the inner workings of the creative minds of Christoph, Des, Jan and Maureen. No they didn’t have grants to make this work. But some of their inspiration may have come from the fluttering of butterfly wings in those galleries that caused a tsunami of creative endeavor in Northside Creative and the Nebuli Group. Our lives are richer because of their work; if we really value their work, and the other 500 or more photographers exhibiting in Head-On this month around Sydney, you as the viewers and members of the community that value creative endeavor, will consider carefully the quality of society we seek to be or might become and hopefully influence others in some positive way.

Before I close, let me give you another example of subliminal artistic influence. I saw this week that the program for the 2016 Australian World Orchestra concerts has been announced. They will be held in September. Picked from the top orchestras around the world, it’s a festival of Australia’s best classical musicians gathered in a scratch orchestra for just a week. These Australians enrich music on every continent. Only through our national support through their long years of study is this possible. And that’s why arts funding is so important. Not necessarily directly; but through osmosis, through propagation, our culture is strengthened and blossoms.

I thank our four fine artists for their work, I hope you’ll read of how they made the work and I hope you will really think about the impact this work has on YOU, and your response to it What does it make you feel? What questions does it provoke in you? Above all I hope we will start seeing many red dots appearing, signifying your support tangibly, with a sale! Because if you do, Opertus will have revealed in you something new, something fresh, something that has in a small way been part of your growth as a thinking human being.

It gives me great pleasure to formally open this exhibition, Opertus, which runs until June 4th. Congratulations to you all, and thank you for your fine work.

 

Opertus is at:
Gallery Lane Cove, Upper Level, 164 Longueville Road, Lane Cove.
Phone +61 2 9428 4898
www.gallerylanecove.com.au
https://www.headon.com.au/
Opening Hours: Monday to Friday 10.00am to 4.30pm,
Saturday: 10.00am to 2.30pm
Closed Sundays and Public Holidays.
Open until 4th June, 2016.  This is a Head On Photo Festival Associated Exhibition.

 © Copyright John Swainston, 2016.

For the benefit of online readers, here are the Artist’s statements. I urge you to try and see this fine work.

OPERTUS STATEMENT- JAN GLOVER

jan-glover
“There are many secrets to be found along our coastline. I have discovered special places where the rocks are glorious colours – not just grey, but blue, green, yellow, orange and red. Sea snails make art as they weave their way through the sand on the bottom of a rock pool. Delicate jewel chains of seaweed hide in narrow cracks in the rocks. The high tide sweeps over the pools causing mini streams and waterfalls. Sunlight catches the ripples and every moment is different.

The day has to be just right for photography – a gentle trickle of water over the rocks, a very slight breeze, and a clear sky to avoid the reflections of the clouds.

This is what I try to capture in this series – those secret moments that only I have seen, and are now gone forever. Hours can be spent peering downwards, looking for treasures. I look for colour, textures, movement, and abstract patterns, which reveal themselves momentarily.

I am a beachcomber, but I collect memories rather than the tangible.”

MAUREEN ROGERS

maureen-rogers
“As a legacy of my working life as a dermatologist, I have always had an eye for shapes, patterns and detail and this has led to a particular interest in macro and close up photography, especially of nature subjects. I find I am inspired by Zen artistic philosophy, which stresses simplicity, allusiveness and restraint aiming to give my work a meditative quality.

The use of a Lensbaby lens in this series gives an abstract quality to these images of common flowers so that the exact nature of the subject may be hard to discern. Hence the emphasis is on form and shape and small details that could be hidden from casual viewers of these flowers as they glance at them quickly in the middle of their busy lives.”


CHRISTOPH MUELLER
“Opertus – concealed, obscure, hidden

chairs 3
chairs 3

A photographer is a person with a camera reproducing a copy of reality. Is this it? A recording of what happens at the very moment the button on the camera is pushed and the shutter opens and closes. Is this all there is to photography? Image = reality!

Art is not what you see, but what you make others see – Edgar Degas

My intention when taking a picture is to record what I ‘see’ which is more than just the reality that presents itself to me.

The images I select for this exhibition present my reality, my view of the world, my experience, and my interpretation.”
DES CRAWLEY

des-crawley
“My work celebrates the “faces on the wall” to be found hidden within wall art/graffiti. Often these faces have been defaced, over painted, rendered within and across architectural features or allowed to decay because of environmental factors. Each image here was found. Originally hidden within an environment that is/was classic urban art. The images come from Madrid, Granada, Cordoba, Paris, Rome, Salamanca, Montreal and Melbourne. They speak to the other ‘hidden’ and that is the universal and often controversial expression of ‘people speak’ –the vernacular. The images have been modified to highlight particular qualities that make them original statements albeit from found work, that is discovered work in public places made by wall artists who remain anonymous or unknown to me. Perversely these studies have discovered them, which is so fitting for the exhibition theme –opertus.”

These statements and images are the Copyright work of the artists credited above.

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