Wendy Fu

Wendy Fu

‘Summer Paradise/ Black Friday sales’

Drawing

Graphite, colour, charcoal pencil; pen

6 pieces

Within my body of work, I chose to incorporate a variety of pencils, ranging from colour to graphite, including charcoal pencils in darker areas and pen for the figures in the note drawings. When working with a familiar medium, I hoped to explore further with tonal variations, textures and art styles. The smaller works dramatically contrasts the main piece through vibrancy and a comical style establishing the dichotomy of the satirical and eulogistic to accentuate the grief of the natural communities.

‘Summer Paradise/ Black Friday sales’ is created to achieve a sense of permanency or ‘stand still’ within the havoc of the 2019-20 bushfires as a visual retrospective on Australia’s changing climates. This, alongside comments on governmental inadequacies, in the 20 dollar vacation portrait and 100 dollar ambiguous quote “Gladys is going nowhere”, shape the note artworks in a satirical tone. The note appropriations explore the plethora of emotions caused by the bushfires from one’s righteousness to a criticism of political figures or a homage to the firefighters. Further, the ironic title and the compact imagery in the graphite drawing parallels the overwhelming situation I have chosen to explore through an emotional lens.

Influencing artist: Zoe Keller, Emman Acasio, Steeven Slavat