On a cold winter morning at Otomys, Zoe Amor brought in her large charcoal drawings and bronze sculptures to the gallery. The works possess a beautiful sense of realism, yet are imbued with dream-like qualities. We reflect on how art as metaphor can carry us above the mundane and why working across mediums is a liberating experience for the artist.
One of the large charcoal drawings before us is one of two from her Architecture of a dream series that was shortlisted for the Paul Guest Drawing Award – a National prize and exhibition highlighting contemporary drawing practice in Australia.
Architecture of a dream: The Gift III and Architecture of a dream: Biome + Ionosphere are haunting works in charcoal, graphite and collage that convey the artist’s ability and intention to reveal visually complex and atmospheric qualities with simple mediums.
Charcoal is an especially liberating medium, as it’s flexibility and forgiving nature offers the artist great freedom of expression to depict qualities and quantities of light, adjusting and integrating tonal values as the drawings evolve. Sometimes, when working in pencil or graphite, the artist lays down a matrix of lines, tonal ground or frottage for the drawing to emerge from that lends spontaneity and unpredictability to the work, allowing for multiple entry points into the picture plane.
The dramatic qualities of The Gift III with it’s giant landmasses, brooding clouds and waters, was originally inspired by a powerful dream. However, it also came out of Zoe’s recent experience of Wagner’s last opera of the Ring Cycle – the cataclysmic Götterdämmerung, which in Germanic mythology is the downfall or ‘Twilight of the gods’. Through the flood, fire and melting ice the sun’s rays illuminate the land beyond and the cyclical nature of time and space - water holds memory, sky holds water, earth holds life.
The epic dreams provide the raw material for these cinematic - like experiences to be transmuted into drawings, narratives and other mediums. The drawing Lake of Memory (Mnemosyne) and the bronze sculptures The Trees and Rosellas in a Ghost gum are imbued with mythic qualities, generating narratives about the realms of life and death and the interplay between humanity and the natural world.
Arranging, modelling and casting in bronze and finishing the work with beautiful patinas, Zoe’s sculptural compositions are often inspired by the wildlife, bush, sky, trees and waterholes of Jarra Country where she lives and works with partner and sculptor Joel Sorensen, in studios they designed and built themselves.
Whether the imagery is drawn from the deep unconscious mind or references specific locations and details, Zoe’s art works evolve with sensitivity and observation until they reveal something of the atmosphere or origins of those places:
‘In constructing alternate worlds in different mediums there is perpetual tension between the real and the imagined. Compelled by a glimpse into this other dimension we respond with gestures that are completely subjective – they are our own. The medium liberates the idea from the inner world to the outer...Art becomes metaphor with a life of it’s own, transporting us from the mundane to the sublime.’
The artist Paul Klee wrote: “We do not always know at once what flows into us from the elemental realm of nature, what comes up from the depths in order to become images.”
This resonates with Zoe as she speaks of drawing on a deep appreciation for the natural world, cultural diversity - ancient and modern - and what she calls the architecture of dreams. Working extensively in the arts and cultural spheres with an artistic practice that encompasses works on paper, painting, sculpture and design, Zoe also completed a Bachelor of Arts and Social Sciences at La Trobe University combining research in aesthetics, sociology, anthropology, art and ecology. It was during this time that she first experienced the epic dreams that were to become the keystones for the Architecture of a dream project:
‘Architecture of a dream is the Mothership for compositions and narratives drawn from dreams, research, and conversations with colleagues across disciplines reflecting on how creative and cultural expression connect us to broader social and ecological circumstances and transitions. The artworks seek to give imagination to evolving scientific and cultural perspectives on diverse forms of life in the soil, waters, space, our bodies and the Earth’s biomes andhow different forms of life might coexist under the impact of extreme ecological and climatic change.
It is also about love – of peaceful, life affirming ways of being in the world and a desire to understand and remember the beneficial connections that exist between humans and other life forms, in the hope that it will (re) generate a deeper appreciation and respect for the natural world.’
At the time of writing Zoe has just been shortlisted with a work from her Architecture of a Dream - Black Earth series for the 2023 WAMA Art Prize, a $25,000 national award for excellence in art inspired by nature created with or on paper.
WAMA - Where Art Meets Nature is a unique art and wildlife precinct like no other with a world-class gallery dedicated to art inspired by the natural environment. Spanning 16 hectares of woodlands, wetlands and botanic gardens, WAMA explores the deep interconnection between art, science and nature. https://wama.net.au/
To enquire about Zoe's work please contact info@otomys.com
