OBSCURATORIUM Comes to Gasworks Arts Park

 The darker edges of art and culture collide in a new exhibition from Kitty Calvert (artists Phill Calvert and Julia Brampton) and Photo maker and visual artist, Robert Earp. OBSCURATORIUM presents a dark tableau of sculpture and photographic narratives with a nod to sideshow, horror and vintage.

Kitty Calvert’s intricate assemblages in the OBSCURATORIUM have been crafted from forgotten relics to evoke stories of lost and haunting beauty.  Earp’s atmospheric photography captures these sculptures of vintage detritus and subverts the traditional ‘still life’. Presented in antique frames the exhibition presents references to a bygone era while giving found objects a life beyond the bin.

The artistic team will create an installation with more in common with the Luna Park Ghost Train than your usual art gallery. A QR code will be supplied to exhibition attendees to find treasure within the art prompting answers to questions. This contemporary art experience will be presented in an experiential gallery accommodating a small number of viewers at a time with a clear entry and exit point. A special cocktail will be created for the opening night with exhibition installations featuring unusual props leaning towards the genre of horror. 

Opening night guests will enjoy the full sensory experience tapping into sight, sound, touch, taste and smell that will bring the modern-day Renaissance-style still-life artworks to life. Beyond opening night, exhibition attendees will experience sight, sound, touch and smell. In a kaleidoscope of sensation, the OBSCURATORIUM will present a cross-generational experience with materials used to preserve found items in installations that will prompt the eye to search for detail within the detail. 

Kitty Calvert is the brainchild of two individuals who have connected over a love of vintage, recycling, upcycling, re-engineering, one another (and margaritas). Together they create beautiful assemblage art. Earp came to acclaim early on in his career with an exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria with only his third roll of film. Fast forward and he was quickly embraced by the commercial and fashion world making his name as a ‘maker’ of photographs, turning concepts. 

Together Calvert and Earp reimagine beauty in the broken and overlooked, inviting viewers to explore themes of childhood, memory and resurrection through a lens of mystery and storytelling. The exhibition opens on 12 March and is free to attend.