Zoe Kirkwood
It’s no surprise that Zoe Kirkwood draws inspiration from the Baroque movement. Similar to that style, her fluid and exuberant works feature exaggerated motions and shapes that mesmerise the viewer. In our latest spotlight, Zoe tells us about her current favourite artist and her experimental process.
Q: Hello Zoe! Can you please tell us a bit about yourself?
A: I’m a visual artist who is currently living and working in Adelaide; I’m a twin, I love shitty action films, and can happily bore anyone senseless talking about contemporary art.
The Screen Set Series 2015 , installation view, CACSA Contemporary 2015, acrylic and oil on Canvas, MDF, Pine, Tasmanian Oak, stainless steel, metal fixings, rope. Photo credit: Che Chorley
Q: Who inspires you? What inspires your art?
A: My work draws inspiration from a number of different sources ranging from the digital screen to contemporary pop culture and art theory, but a common thread throughout all of the work is a preoccupation with ideas of the Baroque.
Q: Do you have a preferred medium?
A: I genuinely love experimenting with new mediums and methods. I find it difficult to choose a single one and find that the different mediums I work with often have a symbiotic relationship – in that what I am doing in sculpture will really resonate with and inform my painting and vice versa. It’s funny, most of my reading recently has had to do with the idea of a ‘post-medium condition’ in art.
Form 4 Series, 2016, detail, euromir, MDF, acrylic paint, metal fixings and rope. Photo credit: Che Chorley
Q: How would you describe your style?
A: Eclectic.
Q: Can you please describe your artistic and creative process i.e.: from lingering idea to putting it into practice?
A: I tend to have volumes of journals that I write or sketch and collect images in – it’s a vestige from art study but one that I find incredibly useful for collating my ideas and plotting an initial trajectory for the work. I often work with new media with each new project and tend to have periods of intense experimentation with these. It sounds trite to say it – but it is only through these periods of experiment and inevitable failure and re-thinking that the work truly takes shape.
The Bel Remix 2015, installation view, MARS Gallery, acrylic and oil on Canvas, MDF, Pine, Tasmanian Oak, stainless steel, metal fixings, rope. Photo credit: Zan Wimberley
Q: Where do you see your art practice taking you in the next five years?
A: I think that the most exciting thing is the element of the unknown…I couldn’t have scripted the last five and can’t imagine scripting the next! Hopefully I will still be making work and travelling.
Q: If you could recommend one artist, who would it be?
A: At present I’m incredibly intrigued by the work of Donna Huanca. I think that the performative element of her work in combination with painting and sculpture is incredibly fascinating. Her colour palette is also insane!
The Schomburgk Yabbies, 2016, cast polyurethane, acrylic paint, mechatronic components, metal fixings, turned pine, tassel fringe, marine rope. Photo credit: Grant Hancock
Q: What is your favourite gallery?
A: The Belvedere Museum in Vienna. I attribute visiting that museum when I was 23 with my decision to go to art school the following year.
Q: Where can we find more of your work?
A: My work is currently on show in Gallery 15 of the Art Gallery of South Australia as a part of the Collections Project with Guildhouse and includes some robotic yabbies.
You can also find my work on Instagram and I have finally got around to doing a website!
In-The-Round, 2016, installation view, Hugo Michell Gallery, acrylic and oil on canvas, euromir, MDF, pine, Tasmanian oak, stainless steel, metal fixings, rope. Photo: James Grose
Q: When you were younger, what or who did you want to be when you grew up?
A: Indiana Jones – I kind of still do.
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