FuguEditions

Post by Ruth Skilbeck

FuguEditions is the name of my publishing imprint, and I will post the link to the new website in the coming days. 

My first publication will be The Writer's Fugue, and I will then be publishing the books in my series Australian Fugue, five interlinked novels that explore aspects of identity, growing up, impacts of trauma  in living in conflict areas (Northern Ireland), friendships, making a career as a young writer, family secrets, and more from the perspective of a woman growing up in the contemporary world, in England, Ireland and Australia. 

I will also be publishing full length books on the most popular topics in this blog, The Daily Fugue which I have kept for over two years now. By far the most popular post has been my story on Sex, Art and the Inner World: Women Artists Reclaiming their Creative Birthright. Featuring Australian, British and international contemporary women artists whom I have interviewed and written about, here in this blog, and in some cases in articles published in arts periodicals and peer reviewed journal. These include Tracey Emin, Diane Mantzaris, Fiona Foley, Del Kathryn Barton, and more.

So going by the popularity of this article there is a worldwide interest in this timely topic. I am working on this publication now. Progress details will be posted including updates on the artists works and exhibitions. 

More information on FuguEditions soon.

All the best,

Ruth

'Urban Aboriginal Women Artists' in the International Journal of the Arts in Society

A research article I wrote on contemporary urban Aboriginal women artists has just been published in the International Journal of the Arts in Society. 


The article discusses Fiona Foley's work in the context of the history of the Boomali Aboriginal art collective, and the transnational communication of urban Aboriginal women's art in the international art world. Also included in the article are photographs and analysis of works from Foley's installation on Cockatoo Island at the 2010 Sydney Biennale, and from the exhibition of indigenous women's art held concurrently at the Sydney College of the Arts, Women's Art, Women's Business with works by ProppaNow artists including Jennifer Herd, Andrea Fischer and Bianca Beeson and curated by Dr Tressa Berman, director of San Francisco-based community arts organisation, BorderZone Arts. This was held as part of the 5th International Conference in on the Arts on Society at Sydney College of the Arts.


Below is one of several photographs in the article of the work of prominent urban Aboriginal Australian artist, Fiona Foley, that I took when she showed me around her first major survey show, Fiona Foley: Forbidden at Sydney's Museum of Contemporary Art, 2009-10.

Figure 6: Fiona Foley. Dispersed 2008, charred laminated wood, aluminum, .303 inch calibre bullets, edition of 3, 9 parts, each 52 x 32 x 25 cm. Collection National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, purchased 2008; and Stud Gins, 2003, exhibited in Fiona Foley: Forbidden Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney 2009. Photograph: Ruth Skilbeck

'Gazing Boldly Back and Forward: Urban Aboriginal Women Artists and New Global Feminisms in Transnational Art'

To date, surprisingly little has been published on urban contemporary Aboriginal art in comparison to 'desert' contemporary Aboriginal art. Yet it is a movement - of profound social, political, cultural and artistic significance - that has gained momentum in Australia, and attracted increasing international attention, since the late 1980s. I begin to explore the art and culture of this movement focusing on women artists, in the essay ‘Gazing Boldly Back and Forward: Urban Aboriginal Women Artists and New Global Feminisms in Transnational Art' just published in The International Journal for the Arts in Society. Discussion in the essay focuses on the work of prominent Australian Indigenous artist Fiona Foley's work, including an interview I conducted with Fiona Foley at her retrospective 'Fiona Foley-Forbidden' (2009-10) at Sydney's Museum of Contemporary Art; the works of artists in the the exhibition Women's Art, Women's Business at Sydney College of the Arts, July 2010; and the context of the Boomali Aboriginal Artist Co-Operative, which Fiona Foley co-founded in 1987. 


I gave a conference presentation based on my research for this paper, at the International Arts in Society Conference at Sydney College of the Arts, last July 2010, which coincided with the Sydney Biennale where Fiona Foley had an installation on Cockatoo Island.

The project was assisted by an Australia Council for the Arts Visual Arts New Work grant.

Here's the abstract of the paper:

Gazing Boldly Back and Forward: Urban Aboriginal Women Artists and New Global Feminisms in Transnational Art

By Ruth Skilbeck

Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australian women contemporary artists made an important contribution to the foundational impacts and ongoing significance of feminism and the 1970s Women’s Art Movement on all that has followed in international contemporary art. Whereas distance from Euro-centric culture was once lamented by Australian settlers as a tyranny, critical distance from colonial power discourses has functioned as a strength for women artists who use their art to gaze back not only at colonial oppression of Indigeneity, but also at western art’s historical hegemonic male representation of women in the public cultural domain. Women artists do this by representing themselves. Fiona Foley, one of Australia’s foremost artists and a curator, academic and writer, has since the 1980s in her art confronted political issues of Indigeneity and identity as a woman in a cultural history of trauma and dispossession- bearing witness to her cultural heritage as a descendent of the Badtjala people, who were forcibly removed from K’gari or Thoorgine (Fraser Island) in the early twentieth century. The paper applies an innovative multimodal fugal critical analysis – drawing on psychological and musical meanings of fugue – to discuss Foley’s work; the paper draws on an interview the author conducted with Fiona Foley at Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art, including photographs of the artist and images of her work. The analysis focuses on Foley’s site specific installation at Cockatoo Island at the Sydney Biennale 2010, and her recent survey show at the MCA.

Keywords:

Australian Contemporary Women Artists, Urban Aboriginal Australian Artists, Indigenous Art, Global Feminisms, Fugal Writing

International Journal of the Arts in Society, Volume 5, Issue 6, pp.261-276. Article: Print (Spiral Bound). Article: Electronic (PDF File; 1.078MB).

'Gazing Boldly Back and Forward: Urban Aboriginal Women Artists and New Global Feminisms in Transnational Art'

To date, surprisingly little has been published on urban contemporary Aboriginal art in comparison to 'desert' contemporary Aboriginal art. Yet it is a movement - of profound social, political, cultural and artistic significance - that has gained momentum in Australia, and attracted increasing international attention, since the late 1980s. I begin to explore the art and culture of this movement focusing on women artists, in the essay ‘Gazing Boldly Back and Forward: Urban Aboriginal Women Artists and New Global Feminisms in Transnational Art' just published in The International Journal for the Arts in Society. Discussion in the essay focuses on the work of prominent Australian Indigenous artist Fiona Foley's work, including an interview I conducted with Fiona Foley at her retrospective 'Fiona Foley-Forbidden' (2009-10) at Sydney's Museum of Contemporary Art; the works of artists in the the exhibition Women's Art, Women's Business at Sydney College of the Arts, July 2010; and the context of the Boomali Aboriginal Artist Co-Operative, which Fiona Foley co-founded in 1987. 


I gave a conference presentation based on my research for this paper, at the International Arts in Society Conference at Sydney College of the Arts, last July 2010, which coincided with the Sydney Biennale where Fiona Foley had an installation on Cockatoo Island.

The project was assisted by an Australia Council for the Arts Visual Arts New Work grant.

Here's the abstract of the paper:

Gazing Boldly Back and Forward: Urban Aboriginal Women Artists and New Global Feminisms in Transnational Art

By Ruth Skilbeck

Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australian women contemporary artists made an important contribution to the foundational impacts and ongoing significance of feminism and the 1970s Women’s Art Movement on all that has followed in international contemporary art. Whereas distance from Euro-centric culture was once lamented by Australian settlers as a tyranny, critical distance from colonial power discourses has functioned as a strength for women artists who use their art to gaze back not only at colonial oppression of Indigeneity, but also at western art’s historical hegemonic male representation of women in the public cultural domain. Women artists do this by representing themselves. Fiona Foley, one of Australia’s foremost artists and a curator, academic and writer, has since the 1980s in her art confronted political issues of Indigeneity and identity as a woman in a cultural history of trauma and dispossession- bearing witness to her cultural heritage as a descendent of the Badtjala people, who were forcibly removed from K’gari or Thoorgine (Fraser Island) in the early twentieth century. The paper applies an innovative multimodal fugal critical analysis – drawing on psychological and musical meanings of fugue – to discuss Foley’s work; the paper draws on an interview the author conducted with Fiona Foley at Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art, including photographs of the artist and images of her work. The analysis focuses on Foley’s site specific installation at Cockatoo Island at the Sydney Biennale 2010, and her recent survey show at the MCA.

Keywords:

Australian Contemporary Women Artists, Urban Aboriginal Australian Artists, Indigenous Art, Global Feminisms, Fugal Writing

International Journal of the Arts in Society, Volume 5, Issue 6, pp.261-276. Article: Print (Spiral Bound). Article: Electronic (PDF File; 1.078MB).