Current Exhibition Details Caroline McQuarrie - KindleThere are two things that photography does for me. The first is to catch a single instant that a person values. The second is to memorialise and elevate that moment above others that were not captured. Photographs are prevalent in my work, whether from my own family archive, or small moments captured from the world around me.
How To Fight Loneliness (Just Smile All The Time)* (2006-08) is a series combining photography and textiles, comprising ten images grouped in five sets of two. Each set is two photographs re-worked in some form of textile, then re-printed as a photogram (a photogram is a photographic print made by placing an object on light sensitive paper and shining light onto it, the paper stays white where the object shields it from the light). The first image in each series is of a home I have lived in, its pair is a group or ‘family’ photograph taken during the period I lived in the house, of myself with the other people who lived there. Questioning social constructions of both the house as ‘home’, and of the artificiality of smiley ‘family’ photos, this also utilises both media’s tendency towards elevating particular images and objects as special. Swerve (2009) continues similar themes. This time working directly into the photographic print, the embroidery provides both a warm domestic cocoon for the happy figures in the images, and a disturbing disruption of the surface of the photograph (and the family) pierced again and again by the needle. This Bouquet (2008/09) comprises 20 photographs taken of small moments noticed in the world around me. These images are largely of the places where humans meet the natural world; the crochet borders allude to our attempts to control nature, despite our lack of ability to do so.
*The title for the series and the works within it taken from the Wilco song ‘How To Fight Loneliness’, from the 1999 album ‘Summerteeth’.
Caroline McQuarrie, October 2009
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; "This Bouquet - Donkey")
; "This Bouquet - Greenhouse")
; "This Bouquet - Pink")
; "This Bouquet - Foxglove")
; "This Bouquet - Roses")
; "This Bouquet - Fence")
; "This Bouquet - Stream")
; "This Bouquet - Moss")
; "This Bouquet - Birdbath")
; "This Bouquet - Kindling")
; "This Bouquet - Woodpile")
; "This Bouquet - Path #2")
; "This Bouquet - Seat")
; "This Bouquet - Hebe")
; "This Bouquet - Rope")
; "This Bouquet - Heart")
; "This Bouquet - Barrier")
; "This Bouquet - Cushions")
; "This Bouquet - Path #1")
; "This Bouquet - Log")
; "Swerve - Untitled #1 (Activities)")
; "Swerve - Untitled #2 (Animals)")
; "Swerve - Untitled #3 (Pets)")
; "Swerve - Untitled #4 (Picnics)")
; "Swerve - Untitled #5 (Playground)")
; "Swerve - Untitled #6 (Riding)")
; "Shine Your Teeth 'Til Meaningless")
; "Sharpen Them With Lies")
; "Drag Your Blanket Blindly")
; "Just Laugh at Every Joke")
; "Fill Your Heart With Smoke")