In response to these eight framed works in The Ireland Family Access Gallery and the installation 'Balanced Chaos' in the Niche, it was through the title 'Personality, Place and Passage' that I found a way to enter the world Mark Hayes exhibits.
Personality
In selecting such literal and recognisable landmarks as iconic representations of place, the artist has engaged in a localised discourse with his audience. These works evolved around the personality of each environment resulting in what appears at first as a traditional landscape narrative and a journey through the picturesque region of Far North Queensland. One work 'Graft'n'Arts' is alone as a purely urban statement of 'personality' and 'The Tower (Cairns Airport)' and 'The Port (Cairns)' to a lesser degree.
With a rather personal and romanticised interpretation, the artist reveals through the work vague symbols of the depth to this 'personality' through preconceptions and knowledge of each location.
Place
The seven land/seascapes;'Trinity Inlet', 'Balancing Rock (Chillagoe)', 'Barron Falls', 'Granite Gorge (Tablelands)', 'Walsh Pyramid (Gordonvale)', 'The Port (Cairns)', 'The Tower (Cairns Airport)', are all locations of delicate ecological sites that have suffered dramatically from trade and commerce. Hayes has focused on representing their iconic qualities through shape, colour and form, but if you investigate the surfaces beyond these grand postcard statements you may find a little irony or earthspirit screaming from within. The mediums used to create these artworks are sculptural yet they are displayed as paintings. Sculptural paintings perhaps? The method of construction has some affinity with earlier work of well known Australian artist Tim Storrier as does the composition and distortion of perspective with painter William Robinson.
To exhibit these works to an audience in Far North Queensland the anticipated response must be quite mixed. Anyone with some knowledge of the environmental history and issues surrounding these sites could interpret these works within a context of paradise lost, symbols of bad or unconsidered environmental planning and management. To others without this knowledge they remain the quaint and somewhat sophisticated image of their holiday destination. This duality of perceptions places the exhibition on some uneven ground.
Passage
The installation 'Balanced Chaos' is a key to the artists basic concern with environmental passage. A revolving combination of backlit billowing cloud just below the ceiling and a shard of grey spacejunk that the artist describes as the "city hulk of Cairns" tracing a circle in sand on the floor contained by driftwood and found bones, the whole structure supported by a sinuous tall mangrove root. This unlikely arrangement is at once humorous and threatening, yet its subliminal qualities take some time to decipher. The installation is a symbol of the slow degradation of these wilderness and ecological environments the artist depicts in the other works. Unlike the comet that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs in a day, Marks comet is man-made and already touching the earth in a slow demise action.
The use of found objects in these works is unlike the work of other familiar local artists who use such materials like Fleur Quinn, Tom Risley, Micheal Winer, Judith Taylor or Ed Koumans. With the work of these artists the found object retains its original identity but assumes a new identity as well. In Hayes' work the found object stops to be identified as the original object and transforms entirely into something else, or is representative of itself such as sticks or stones. Hayes finishes his work to a fine detail giving an impression of sophistication and craftsmanship. His ability to transform objects and surfaces through construction and painted finishes is highly refined and engaging. The works can be encountered on a number of levels. Good luck to their showing in Sydney later this year.
Russell Milledge 1-7-97
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