Incremental loss

Former Union Bank

The National Centre for Photography

Ballarat, Australia, 2019

Incremental Loss was an ambitious project commissioned by the Ballarat Foto Biennale in 2019 as a way to celebrate the transition of their recently purchased former Union bank site. The commissioned residency was undertaken over the summer of 2019 and finalised with an exhibition that celebrated the outcomes created through this time. This was later followed by a photographic exhibition for the 2019 Biennale.

Through this experience it reinforced my great love of exploring spaces in transition. There is something incredibly special about a site that is sitting at the threshold of change, whether it is transitioning towards loss or renewal. I began work at the former Union Bank site by simply sitting and experiencing each space, watching the light and, in a way, adjusting to its stillness and quiet presence. There were, obvious signs of its past, but what I was particularly interested in was seeking out the layers beneath this: alternate ways of experiencing its spaces other than through the histories that have framed it. What we know sits squarely before us. Here I was interested in searching for unknowns - for quieter stories and moments through the process.

Certainly, the gestural cuts were not quiet, but breaking through these surfaces allowed access into spaces that usually remained unseen. Whether I exposed mundane utilities and substructures or deep, dark voids, my aim was to consider new ways to experience the many spaces in this site. Finding a balance to the tension of a cut with fallen gestures that revealed, at times, a gracefulness (the ceiling cut in the front room) or a subtle humor (the corner cut from the cabinet). As they fell and furled into the space they appeared animated, enlivening the stillness and questioning the emptiness of the building. In this exhibition the site is no longer a bank or an accounting firm or any other business. It sat between, around and beyond all these, taking advantage of our knowledge of how we inhabit and utilise space and the way we perceive its purpose.

Incremental Loss, as a title was drawn from the tapered cut action but also looked more broadly at how we understand loss in relation to time. It positioned the outcome of the fall in the moment, as if first experienced or even momentary, with the possibility of repair as we retrace each cut gesture imagining its return.

Project credits

Commissioned by Ballarat International Foto Bienalle & The National Centre for Photography

Curated by Fiona Sweet and Aaron Bradbrook