Imperfect Perusal

Opening reception: 16 October 2023, 18.00 h at MATDOT Art Center

My practice engages spatially and temporally with ideas of site, and explores relationships between cultural and natural spaces through the lens of Assemblage and Collage. During my time in Thailand, I have spent my time visiting markets, shopping malls, temples and Buddha offering shops to make collections of images and objects to use in my work. I have harvested inspiration from ancient temple walls, incense from offering shops, beads from markets, stones from Thai artist’s gardens, trinkets and tableware from shopping malls to create my “Imperfect Perusal” of Thailand.

I stack found objects to make small pagoda sculptures and collaborate with fire and water to scar and quench paper surfaces. These processes manufacture an archaeology; a sense of time passing or a fragmentation in the work. In Thailand, I have used incense as the fire element to create marks on paper and sand paper to erase images. I have layered and collaged the paper to both conceal and reveal my impressions. My approach encourages reflection on the transitory nature of place and the balance between creation and destruction. Use your eyes and experience, take your time with art and it will reveal its meaning.

— Wendy Teakel
Bangkok, October 2023