Louise Paramor @ NGV

I first saw a sculpture by Louise Paramor when her Noble ape was exhibited in Melbourne Now 2013; it is currently installed in the garden at the back of NGV International. Other people might know her from her Panorama Station sculpture beside the freeway in Carrum Downs. Then I saw Paramor’s sculpture, Ursa Major being installed in Federation Square for the Melbourne Prize 2014. I hadn’t seen any of her previous twenty or so years of exhibiting sculpture.

Louis Paramor, Noble ape, fiberglass, plastic and steel

Currently the NGV is exhibiting Paramor in two large spaces on the third floor of the Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia with a specially commissioned installation of new paper sculptures and a survey of her recent colourful plastic assemblages.

Palace of the Republic is a series of massive paper sculptures. Honeycomb paper decorations on a scale that will leave you awestruck. It is a reference Paramor’s earlier artistic practice before she started to collage found plastic objects.

Louis Paramor, Palace of the Republic, paper, steel, aluminium and plywood

Unlike the personal art of Del Kathryn Barton, exhibited on the same floor to the Potter Centre, Paramor’s sculptures inspires no interest in the artist. There is nothing that I can tell you about her that will help you make any more sense of her art, so I will tell you nothing. Likewise you don’t need to know the history of art, anything of biochemistry or French to make sense of her art. Partially because her art makes little sense; her sculptures are cool and humorous and I know this by the smile that they grew on my face when I saw them.

A curator explains them noting that they “combine formal concerns with a pop-inspired sensibility.” That is arranging found plastic in an asymmetrical way makes them look silly and funky.

Studies for Boomtown is a series of maquettes for sculptures that demonstrate Paramor’s seemingly inexhaustible creativity. Perhaps it is inexhaustible due to the supply of plastic objects in the world.

Louis Paramor, Studies for Boomtown, 2016, plastic, steel, wood

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Works on & works from paper

This week I saw two exhibitions of work with paper; at Flinders Lane Gallery there is work on paper and fortyfive downstairs has “Unfold: works from paper.”

In the main exhibition space at Flinders Lane Gallery “Silent Yesterday” by Mami Yamanaka is mostly works on Arches paper (with the exception of two paintings on canvas). In some of the pieces Yamanaka has overlayed two sheets of paper mixing the cut out shapes of birds or butterflies on one sheet with her intense, hypnotic, floral patterns behind it. (In the interest of full disclosure Mami Yamanaka’s partner, Adam Nash was a former colleague of mine at LookSmart.)

In “The Paper Room” at Flinders Lane Gallery there are works on paper by various artists printing or painting on paper. It is not that exciting except for the two etchings depicting twigs and their shadows by Christine Wilcocks where the handmade paper resembles a sandy ground. I didn’t like Marise Maass’s series of paintings on paper as they looked like small versions of Jenny Watson paintings – more crudely painted horses.

At fortyfive downstairs the artists were using paper not simply as a support for the art but as the medium for the art. Curator, Sally McKittrick has done a great job at bringing together 10 artists who make art from paper. The artists have animated, cut, carved, bent, folded, knitted, punched and woven paper. I was particularly taken by the music boxes by Adam Simmons where the punched paper rolls are both elegant sculptural forms and information storage.

The connection between plants and paper features in this exhibition as paper is often made from plant fibre pulp. Lan Nguyen Hoan has a made field of paper grass and has animated it in a video. Claudia Gleave and Sara Nothrop construct imaginary paper plants in glass jars. And Alana Sivell also created plants from paper.

This is just the work on and from paper in two of Melbourne’s galleries. The paperless office may still be a long way off but the paperless art world isn’t even a vision of the future.