Hannah-Kate Proctor found the inspiration she needed to create her winning ARTEXPRESS piece from the place she gets most of her advice from – her mum.
The 2019 HSE Visual Arts student said the idea for her sculpture, entitled Detachment from her origin, began over conversations about her mum’s emigration to Australia.
“It’s a personal story,” she said.
“It’s about my mum’s experience of moving here from America 20 years ago.”
Hannah-Kate’s mother Angie was born and raised in North Carolina.
She moved to NSW with her new husband on 4 October 1998, after the pair had met at a church conference.
Hannah-Kate said her mother’s move wasn’t initially a positive experience.
“My mother has always been a great communicator,” Hannah-Kate said.
“She was a pastor’s daughter and very sociable.
“But that changed a bit when she came to live in Australia.
“She wasn’t popular. People made fun of her accent and she felt she wasn’t embraced by her new community like she’d hoped she would be.
“She was such a good communicator but now the communicator struggled to communicate because people made fun of her.”
Hannah-Kate, a former Belmont Christian College student, is one of this year’s NSW Government’s ARTEXPRESS winners.
Her sculpture, totaling 70cm in height, consists of a block of clay split into two ‘islands’ and separated by a gulf filled with blue-pigmented poxy.
Maps adorn the sides of the piece, and it is topped with a brass miniature figurine.
The eye-catching design symbolises the detachment her mother felt when she crossed oceans to settle in a new homeland.
“The blue is the oceans and the brass figure is my mother feeling so small looking at the two islands she belongs to,” Hannah-Kate said.
“The maps on the sides are of North Carolina and NSW – the two places in her life.”
Hannah-Kate said her mum’s story had a positive resolution.
“Mum was courageous to move from home to Australia,” she said.
“I made my art piece because she has inspired me with her bravery.
“I didn’t create my art out of a place of pain for my mum, I created it out of a place of my mum’s personal experiences and the healing that has come from some unfortunate circumstances.”
“She means everything to me. She’s a really nurturing woman who has been through a lot and she still reflects selflessness and love.”
The sculpture’s creative process included clay, concrete, pigmented poxy resin and bronze casting.
While COVID-19 has meant the annual ARTEXPRESS won’t feature at NSW galleries in it’s traditional format, organisers have launched a virtual reality exhibition showcasing the works of all 50 winners online.
Minister for Education and Early Childhood Learning, Sarah Mitchell, said that ARTEXPRESS was the Oscars of the HSC art world and she was happy students would still get to display their work.
“Everyone can go online to enjoy 50 exceptional student artworks across 12 visual art forms,” she said.
“The ARTEXPRESS exhibition is incredibly important, allowing our best students to receive recognition for their work and provides exposure to start careers.
“Artists like Ben Quilty, David Griggs, McLean Edwards, Melissa Chiu and Jasper Knight were all hung at ARTEXPRESS, one of NSW’s most popular exhibitions.”
The virtual reality exhibition was produced using a process called photogrammetry and allows viewers to examine artworks in detail as 3D objects from 360 degrees.
The works, from students in 29 government schools and 21 non-government schools, include painting, drawing, sculpture, ceramics, photo-media, time-based works, designed objects, documented forms, printmaking, textiles and fibre and graphic design.
Almost 450 NSW 2019 HSE visual arts students were nominated for the exhibition from 8,552 artworks submitted.
For more stories like this:
