Kellie O’Dempsey. Juried Artist
Constellations
The Cube at QUT Gardens Point
Redcliffe Art Gallery
Artist Statement
Wish You Were Here is installation video collage animation and augmented reality. The project began as a response to the pandemic’s lockdown life. Uncanny household objects collide with uncertain landscapes and marine life. In search of progressmultiple figures attempt to travelyet go nowhere. Figurative and abstract forms gently smash together as we all fumble for connection. Wish You Were Here is an interdisciplinary work that transforms isolation and endurance into a mesmerising carnival of ghostly silhouettes. Through repetitive rhythm and monotonous loopsnon-specific locations and an unspecified timethis work blends the physical and the psychological for a moment of hypnotising and joyful reprieve.
Wish You Were Here borrows absurdist collage from Dada; steals its introspective title from Pink Floyd’s song of the same name; and visualises artist Kellie O’Dempsey’s experience of being a primary carer. The work acknowledges the emotionalpsychological and physical balancing act of holding space for infirm family. Domestic items speak to the unpaidand unacknowledgedyet nevertheless expected responsibilities that womenmothers and daughtersfulfil in the family home. For O’Dempseythe unknowable and surreal landscape of her father’s ongoing illness was made stranger by COVID-19. Wish you were here combines the loss of selfassociated with caring for otherswith a psychedelic space of the past 4 years and promises endless energy to keep trying in this weird and changing world.
About the artists
Queensland-based creative and producerDr Kellie O’Dempseyworks across the arts and cultural sector as a research-based practitionereducator and project developer. Kellie’s work explores the potential for public and private spaces to generate shared experiences of transformation and wonder. Completing a PhD at Queensland College of Art (QCA) in 2018 Kellie delivers solo and collaborative projects and programs in both regional and metropolitan areasfrom the National Gallery of Australia (NGA) and Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) to Cairns and the Sunshine Coast.
Creating site-generated installations and performances that integrate videocollagearchitectural spacegestural lineperformance and digital drawingKellie’s approach is diverse and experimental. Using installation and projection Kellie manipulates space and alters perception to transform and reinvigorate the familiar whilst establishing a sense of brilliance. The immersive site installation and performance drawing works invite the audience to engage directly with the visceral process of making. Kellie’s past performances include: Art after Dark; Pier 2/3; 18th Biennale of Sydney; MONA FOMAHobart; White Night Melbourne; and the National Gallery of AustraliaCanberraMuseum of Brisbane and Botanica Temporary Art in the Brisbane Botanical Gardens. Kellie is represented by Jan Manton Gallery in Brisbane.
Credits: Mick Dick – SoundHelena Papageorgiou AR Animation