'Trinitynine' - art that intrigues
A large black box sits in the branches of the College oak. A big red ‘V’ partly covers the windows of the Cowan residential block, and there’s a printed motif of rats’ paws running up the columns of the Burge building.
They’re intriguing, they’re engaging, and they’re art.
They are just part of Trinitynine, a group exhibition created in and around the College buildings and grounds by artists of Ocular Lab Inc, a collaboratively run gallery in nearby Brunswick. With support from Trinity College and the City of Melbourne, the artists have, in their own words, ‘delved to explore subjects such as architecture, history, academia, sport, decoration, and nature through a number of highly developed projects that are on the one hand materially ephemeral, yet conceptually complex and continuous’.
The Dean, Dr Peter Tregear, was delighted that Trinity College could host this exhibition, which has aroused much interest – and a certain sense of displacement – among students and staff.
‘Trinity has a long and fine tradition of supporting contemporary Australian art,’ he said. ‘It does so because it believes that a university education does not begin and end in the classroom, but is best seen as a life-enhancing activity of the broadest kind. This exhibition extends the College’s educational role by encouraging us to reflect upon the physical qualities and architectural features of the College, to consider their wider cultural significance and invites us more generally to be not so much passive consumers as active and critical interpreters of the world around us.’
The participating artists – the Trinity Nine – were:
John Abbate, Damiano Bertoli, Sandra Bridie, Julie Davies, Raafat Ishak, Sean Loughrey, Sally Mannall, Tom Nicholson and Alex Rizkalla. The free exhibition was open to the public and ran for 6 weeks.
An excellent catalogue of the exhibition, including essays by Justin Clemens and Max Delany, can be purchased from Trinity College.
