Clink project #6: Duet with Mother
ClinkProject is an annual collaboration between staff and students from Dunedin School of Art and Auckland’s Hungry Creek Art and Crafts School. Clink Project #6 was invited to Melbourne to take part in Radiant Pavilion, 2019.
We made work in response to the collection of the Grainger Museum- Australia’s only autobiographical collection.
Percy Grainger was a musician, composer and musical innovator. He pushed the boundaries of music in his time and believed creating sound should be available to all. The collection is not so straight forward, it also tells the story of his personal life. Raised and home schooled by his syphillitic mother, it’s well documented they had a close and intense relationship. Rose Grainger, increasingly succumbing to syphillitic insanity, took her life after allegations of incest or an “improper relationship” between her and her son emerged.
Percy Grainger was complicated person- a musician, devoted son, writer, inventor, teacher, composer- with lesser known traits such as self proclaimed sexual deviance, BDSM practices and deeply concerning racist views. Despite his racialist standing his collection contains items taken and appropriated from other cultures.
The exhibtion resulted in a group of 20 jewellers and artist peeling back the layers that are: Percy Grainger.
I am responding to Percy’s close relationship with his ailing mother by implying that he may have developed a fear of death and an obsession for remembrance.
Duet With Mother (recycled silver, lab glass, garnet sand). Displayed on Percy’s childhood piano where his mother taught him to play.
