My work explores the nature of gender, identity, desire and sexuality as communicated and represented within cultural and social experience. I often work with aspects of Western culture that remain unspeakable – drawing out repressed experiences, secrets and taboos. Psychoanalysis, anthropology, and literature inform both my approach and practice, as have the various creative collaborations I have undertaken with diverse communities. For example, my work with people with an intellectual disability has deeply influenced my understanding of the value of communication that occurs outside of verbal language – the dialogues that may be sensed or felt rather than spoken.
In 1997, I established ‘The Museum of Love and Romance’ (MOLAR) an imaginary institution founded as an all-encompassing bridge to embrace all kinds of representations of love and desire. Ideally MOLAR represents a place to love more inclusively, or to love differently. To further extend my understanding of representations of desire across cultures, in 2000 I was awarded an Australia Council grant to research collections of erotic art in Japan, China, America and the United Kingdom. I have presented a series of exhibitions and projects in response to my explorations including ‘About Love’, a soundscape of the voices of people with an intellectual disability speaking of love for ABC Radio National (2000); ‘The Museum of Love and Romance presents ‘The Big Horse and other stories…’, Centre for Contemporary Art, Adelaide (2001) and ‘Love Maps and Shadow Play’, Experimental Art Foundation, Australia (2003).
My present research and practice has developed from my previous examination of erotic experiences across cultures and is seeking a rereading of desire and erotica. I am specifically interested in the ways in which feminine desire and pleasure could augment familiar understanding of embodiment and sensual experience. For Helene Cixous, feminine desire may be viewed as inclusive, reciprocal, excessive, multiple and boundless, and not specifically privileging of vision in its expression but embracing of all sensual experience. Commonly repressed within the Western culture, feminine desire may provide alternative expressions of being: ways of existing, creating, desiring and speaking - differently.
Utilising sculpture, film and performance work, I wishing to express more open conceptions of both desire and embodiment, in ways that are less confined by traditionally gendered perspectives. Employing the thoughts of Cixous, and also those of Deleuze and Guattari, I am seeking to represent states of desire that may be both generative and becoming – as a listening, playful and productive dialogue between mind and body, imagined and real desire, fleshed and fantastical space.
Education
1984 Bachelor of Fine Arts, South Australian School of Art.
1987-95 Part-time study in Psychology, Women's Studies and Anthropology towards Bachelor of Arts (Social Science), Flinders University
Selected Individual Exhibitions
2003 Love Maps and Shadow Play, Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide
2001 The Museum of Love and Romance presents: The Big Horse and other stories...,with video by Alison Main, Contemporary Art Centre, Adelaide
1998 from The Museum of Love and Romance, stripp, Melbourne A monument to wolf children, Caravan, Adelaide
Untitled, temporary window project, University of South Australia Art Museum, Adelaide
1996 "How deep is the lake?", Garage, Canberra, ACT
1995 “Aire de la Noche” (The Night Air), Contemporary Art Centre, Adelaide
1994 Telepathy, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane
1993 Possible Clouds, Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide.
1991 White Wall, Photospace, Canberra School of Art, Canberra
1989 Contemporary Art Centre, Adelaide Selected Group Exhibitions
2004 Full View, Artspace, Adelaide Festival Centre, Adelaide
XX1V, Limousine Bull, Aberdeen
2003 New York Calling, Australia Studio, P.S.I Contemporary Art Center, New York
2002 Installation Stills, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne
Apartment, Schoolhill, Aberdeen
2000 Installation Stills, Contemporary Art Centre, Adelaide
Defiling the Object, the Substation, Singapore
Chemistry, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide
Present, Artspace, Adelaide Festival Centre. Collaboration with Bruce Rodenrys, an artist with an intellectual disability
In Search of Experience - reconsidering the readymade, Green on Red Gallery, Dublin
1998 false endings, Canberra Contemporary Art Space, Canberra
every day, 11th Biennale of Sydney, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney. Collaboration with Cecilia Clarke and Bruce Rodenrys,
two artists with an intellectual disability
Defiling the Object, Nexus Gallery, Adelaide
City Provoked, Storey Hall, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne
1997 Wild Kingdom, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane
Body Suits, 200 Gertrude St, Melbourne (touring nationally 1997-99)
Mutant Paradigm, Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia
Still Life still lives, Art Gallery of South Australia
1996 Monash University Art Prize, Monash University Gallery, Victoria
1996 Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art, Art Gallery of South Australia
Out of Adelaide, Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide
1995 Neo-Geo Comestibles?!, Access Gallery, National Gallery of Victoria
1994 Bad Toys, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Victoria
Localities of Desire, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney
Fania, University of South Australia Art Museum
don’t stop, Linden - St. Kilda Arts Centre, Victoria
Postmodern Adelaide, Union Gallery, Adelaide and regional centres of South Australia
The Aberrant Object, Museum of Modern Art, Heide, Victoria
Shadows on the Wall, Lynx Gallery, Adelaide
Jemmy, Ebenezer Studios Basement, Adelaide
1992 Independent Vocabularies, University of South Australia Art Museum
1991 Juggling the Roles, Prospect Gallery, Adelaide
Transparencies, University of South Australia Art Museum
1990 Young Contemporaries, Irving Galleries, Sydney
Transparencies, 200 Gertrude Street, Melbourne
Posthillshoistism, Museum of Contemporary Art, Brisbane
Black Bud, Bullring Gallery, The Jam Factory, Adelaide
1989 Australian Perspecta '89, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Selected Bibliography
2004 Bolton, Ken, ‘Australian Women Artists’, Jamini, Vol2 No 6, Nov, Bangladesh pp.69 - 79
Bolton, Ken, Bronwyn Platten: Love Maps and Shadow Play, Eyeline 53, Summer 2003-04
2003 Newall, Micheal, ‘Bronwyn Platten – Love Maps and Shadow Play’, Broadsheet 2003
Neylon, John, ‘Finding power from risky visual metaphors’, Adelaide Review, Oct-Nov
Walker, Wendy, ‘Brave Ambiguity’, The Advertiser, 11 Oct
Biggs, Iain, ‘An ambiguous tenderness – mapping of the unspoken’ in Love Maps and Shadow Play (catalogue), Experimental Art Foundation
2001 Walker, Wendy, ‘Erotic look’, The Advertiser, 25 Oct
Ward, Peter, “Beastly display toys with taboos’, The Australian, 12 Oct
The Museum of Love and Romance presents: “The Big Horse and other stories”, Contemporary Art Centre, Adelaide (catalogue) text by Lindy Warrell
Walker, Wendy, 'Bronwyn Platten: Unlocking the Silence', Broadsheet Vol 30, No 3 Sep - Nov
2000 Speck, Catherine, 'Chemistry: Art in South Australia 1990-2000', Art Monthly on line, October
Oakley, Jason, 'Curation, an interview with Finola Jones', S.S.I. newsletter, March/ April
Dunne, Aidan, 'Titles turn art objects into guessing games', The Irish Times, 2 February
Hartigan, Marianne, 'Ready-made collection', The Sunday Tribune, 30 January
Owens, Kiaran, 'Ordinary Decent Objects', Dublin Event Guide, 19 January
1998 every day, 11th Biennale of Sydney, (catalogue) text by Robyn McKenzie
Chapman, C, 'Adelaide Roundup - The Australian Marsupial Association', Log Illustrated (NZ), No 5
Chapman, C, 'Some notes on pornography, contemporary art and social politics', Artlink Vol 18, 3
Hill, Peter, 'Body works a vision in eye of the beholder', The Australian, 31 July
Fraser, Virginia, 'city provoked: these questions and more...', Artlink, Vol 18, No 2
1997 Main, Alison, 'Shift', Broadsheet, Vol 26, No 4
Mutant Paradigm, Contemporary Art Centre, Adelaide (catalogue), text by John Barbour
Mark Jackson, 'Popular Windows', RealTime 22, Dec - Jan, 1997-98
Body Suits, 200 Gertrude Street (catalogue), text by Jane Trengove
Warhurst, Myfanwy, 'I've got you over my skin', The Age, EG, 4 July
1996 Huppatz, Danny, ‘Dr Chapman's Group Therapy’, Broadsheet, Vol 25 No 2
Walker, Linda Marie, 'Imperfect present continuous’, Real Time 12, April - May
‘activism and origami’, Outrage, No 155, April
Dutkiewicz, Adam, ‘Adelaide displays a leading edge’, Business Review Weekly, 4 March
Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art, Art Gallery of South Australia, February (catalogue), text by Jyanni Steffensen
1995 'Tvisual writing', (collaboration with artist/writer, Jyanni Steffensen) Agenda, No 39/40, Feb 1994
'Drawings and Ideas - pages from a recent notebook', Otis Rush No 9, May
Thomas, Daniel, ‘Adelaide light and dark’, RealTime 10, Dec - Jan.
Chapman, Christopher, ‘Degrees of intensity’, Broadsheet, Vol 24 No 4
'Aire de la Noche The Night Air', Contemporary Art Centre, (catalogue), text by Lindy Warrell
Ward, Peter, ‘Old Masters and Thingummygigs’, The Australian Magazine, 7 - 8 January
1994 Valamanesh, Angela, ‘Self -Determination’, Artlink, 81 Vol 14 No 4
'bad toys', Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (catalogue), text by Natalie King
Artfan, No 3/4, November
Kenneally, Cath, '(Where Are We Now?) Women’s Shows in Adelaide in Suffrage Centenary Year’, Broadsheet, Vol 23 No 3
Ward, Peter, ‘Dispatches from a city of fallen angels’, The Australian, 19 August
Fereday, Susan, ‘Jemmy’, Agenda, No 36, May
The Aberrant Object, Museum of Contemporary Art at Heide (catalogue), text: Juliana Engberg
1993 Bolton, Ken, ‘Artist-run Alternatives’, Art and Australia, Vol 31 No 2
Steffensen, Jyanni, ‘The Body in Question’, Broadsheet, Vol 22 No 2, June
Marvell, Leon, ‘Bronwyn Platten/Cecilia Clarke’, Art and Text, No 45
Possible Clouds, Experimental Art Foundation (catalogue), text by Linda Marie Walker
Crabb, James, ‘Possible Clouds’, Entropy, No 3
1992 Walker, Linda Marie, ‘Independent Vocabularies’, Agenda, No 24, August
Independent Vocabularies, University of South Australia Art Museum (catalogue), text by Anne Brennan
1991 Bolton, Ken, ‘Adelaide commentary - Black Bud’, Otis Rush, No 6/7
Adams, J, ‘Juggling the Roles, Wonderwoman, Supermum and Me’, Artlink, Vol 11
1990 Lynn, Elwynn, ‘Looking back into the future’, The Weekend Australian, 17 - 18 March
1989 Australian Perspecta, National Gallery of New South Wales (catalogue), text by Ken Bolton
Steffensen, Jyanni, ‘New Pleasures Emerge’, Broadsheet, Vol 18, March
Artist Projects & Residencies
2003 Artist in residence, South Australian School of Art, University of South Australia, Adelaide
2003 Artist in residence, Woodend Hospital, Aberdeen
2000 'About Love' - a collaborative soundscape with Mike Ladd, poet and ABC radio presenter, that features the voices of eight people with
an intellectual disability talking about love, The Listening Room, Classic FM, Australian National Radio,10 July
2000 travel/speak: a cross-cultural art project with artist Niki Vouis and people with disabilities for Nexus Multicultural Art Centre, March - July
2000 Present: an art project and exhibition with John Foubister and artists with an intellectual disability for High Beam, an arts festival show
casing work inspired or influenced by experiences of disability, Adelaide
1997 Founded The Museum of Love and Romance, an ongoing project exploring conceptions of love and desire
1997 Established The Building Art Project, a collaborative project with artist, John Foubister and people with an intellectual disability.
1997 Artist, City Provoked, a temporary public art project, Melbourne
1991 Artist in residence, Painting, Canberra School of Art, ACT
1990 Artist for 'Juggling the Roles', an Art and Working Life Project
1988 Artist in residence with artist, Anna Platten at Strathmont Centre, a residential institution for 500 people with intellectual disabilities, Adelaide
Awards
2004 Awarded small project grant, Arts and Humanities Research Council, for Imaginal Regions: opening out the atlas, collaborative
practice-based international research project
2003 Awarded Professional Development Grant, Arts South Australia
2000 Awarded Professional Development Grant, through the Visual Arts/Crafts Board of the
Australia Council to research museums and collections devoted to erotic art in China, Japan, U.S.A. and Britain in 2001
1998 Awarded Special Project Grant, Arts South Australia, towards The Museum of Love and Romance
1996 Awarded Special Project Grant, Arts SA, with Cecilia Clarke, an artist with an intellectual disability to develop a collaborative work for
'Body Suits’ a national touring exhibition
1995 Awarded Special Project Grant, South Australian Department for the Arts
1994 Awarded residency, Greene Street studio, New York, through the Visual Arts/Crafts Board of the Australia Council
1994 Awarded Special Project Grant, South Australian Department for the Arts
1992 Awarded Special Project Grant, South Australian Department for the Arts
1990 Awarded Special Project Grant, South Australian Department for the Arts
Published Writing
2005 ‘Words of Selves (Word (For) Word’, in wordwork, exhibition of Chad McCail, Emma Anderson, Arthur Watson, Finola Jones,
The Art Gallery, Aberdeen Royal Infimary (catalogue) May
2005 ‘Minding Body – Embodying Mind’ in 'Imaginal Regions: opening out the atlas with seven international researchers'
www.imaginalregions.co.uk
2004 ‘New Antennae’, in: 'Full View', Adelaide Festival Centre (catalogue), April
2002 ‘Animal Love’, in: Artlink, Vol 22 No1
1999 'The Ivor Brown Incident' in: Alison Main Thinkery Contemporary Art Centre (catalogue), September
1998 'Looped Desire', Sarah Minney, First Press , Contemporary Art Centre (catalogue), February
1998 'A monument to wolf children' in 'City Provoked', RMIT Gallery, RMIT University (catalogue) May
1997 'Some thoughts and some questions', in: 'Mutant Paradigm' , Contemporary Art Centre (catalogue), July
1993 'Orlan or Orlane? The Pleasure of Masochism and/or New Identities', Broadsheet, Vol 22 No 4 1990
'Poor Mexico, so far away from God and so close to America' on Adelaide Festival for the Arts exhibition 'Mexico: Out Of The Profane'
in: Broadsheet, Vol 19 No 2, June
Employment
2004-ongoing: Curator, Grampian Hospitals Art Trust, Aberdeen Royal Infirmary Aberdeen
2004-05 Researcher, Gray’s School of Art
2001- 2004 Part time lecturer, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen
1990 –2000 Lecturer, South Australian School of Art, University of South Australia:
1996 Canberra School of Art, The Australian National University
1990 –2001 Artist./ Faciliator, Community Bridging Services and Strathmont Centre for people with special needs
Selected Curatorial Projects
2005 Wordwork, The Art Gallery, Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, group exhibition of work by Emma Anderson, Finola Jones, Chad McCail, Arthur Watson
2003 Imagination’s Chamber, group exhibition of 17 artists from Scotland negotiating the nature of dreams and unconscious experiences, Gray’s
School of Art, Aberdeen which accompanied the 10th International Word and Image Conference, ‘Such stuff as Dreams are Made On:
Enchantment, Fancy and the Creative Imagination’
2000 Travelspeak with artist/curator Niki Vouis and four artists with a disability, Nexus Multicultural Arts Centre, Adelaide
ongoing- The Museum of Love and Romance, formed 1997
1997 Popular Windows, with artist John Foubister and artists with an intellectual disability
July 2005
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