Flat Press, 2016 – 2017

Through image, sculpture and installation Steven Carson investigates ideas centred on materiality and process, specifically the capacity for these formal considerations to function as key elements to communicate meaning. Within Flat Press the artist has sought to explore pleasure and joy, and has considered how these emotional resonances may be expressed through flat picture panels as well as to be activated further within public space.

“I approached the design of the work by re-presenting a range of visual references, combining tropes of commercial signage, advertising, street art graffiti, psychedelic and cartoon graphics and mid-twentieth century formalist abstraction. Whilst it is my intention that these contextual references are accessible, I have aimed to engender a sense of uncertainty through playfully contrasting these visual cues and exploring points of distinction, conflict and similarity. Through the course of the installation of this work, I will undertake small interventions or additions to explore how the panel components can serve as catalysts to enliven the site.”

Steven Carson has worked as a visual artist since 1987. He was awarded: the Whyalla Art Prize (2007); Helpmann Academy Artist in Residence, Sanskriti Kendra, New Delhi, India (2005); and the Moorilla Estate Prize, City of Hobart Art Prize (1999). He completed a Master of Visual Arts at Queensland College of Art (1997) and was awarded a PhD from the University of Tasmania, Tasmanian College of the Arts, Hobart (2016). Carson’s work is held in various collections including: Artbank, State Library of Queensland, University of Southern Queensland, Ipswich Regional Art Gallery, Toowoomba Regional Gallery and private collections within Australia.