Visual+Arts+-+Illusions+-+NGV+and+IPG



===The National Gallery Of Victoria is a building filled with beautiful art of many kinds. The illusions that I have witnessed in the Arts Centre contain such simplicity and intricate design that when the two of those things are combined, they make something amazing.=== ===To make her artworks, Shettar, a woman that was born in the year 1970 in Bangalore, uses organic and human made materials: tamarind kernel paste, lacquer, muslin, automotive paint, wood, fishing line, beeswax, dyed thread, latex, rubber and steel. They are only a few of the things she uses in her artworks to make them come to life.=== ===Shettar's artworks are based on natural phenomenons. Each one has its own illusions as to what it represents and is meant to reflect upon. Some of them are in the response of plants in the presence of sunlight and sudden movement, the interaction between water and sunlight, the fluorescence of fireflies, the human sneeze as a reaction to bright light (natural or not), the relationship with space, exploration of tradition, material experimentation, engagement with nature etc. Every one of them includes and reflects volume, attachment, suspension, shadow, light and materiality.=== ===The exhibition that contained the illusions that I am studying is called Ranjani Shettar, Dewdrops and Sunshine. Shettar is an Indian sculptress who was born in 1977 and her influence for art was the unique approach to materiality. The exhibition contains 7 artworks named:===
 * ===Fire In The Belly===
 * ===Heliotropes===
 * ===Touch Me Not===
 * ===Interplay===
 * ===Transitions===
 * ===Sun-Sneezers Blow Light Bubbles===
 * ===Flame Of The Forest===

If you would like to view a couple more of her illusions (not all), click on this link:
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//Sun-Sneezers Blow Light Bubbles//
===Sun-Sneezers Blow Light Bubbles was made in the time period of 2007 and 2008. It was moved into the Dewdrops and Sunshine exhibition but was originally made to fit in a long vertical spaced room in the Institute of Contemporary Art located in Boston. Shettars' inspiration for this art was the theory that some humans sneeze when they are exposed to bright sunlight. The material used to make this illusion are stainless steel that is suspended from clear wire and rapped in muslin cloth. The fabric was then stained with tamarind kernels and finished with a coat of lacquer. The illusion of it is that it is meant to resemble floating bubbles.===



//Interplay//
===Interplay was made especially for Dewdrops and Sunshine. The method in which it was made: they had to string beeswax beads along two weaving threads, the beads are light and dark shades of blue on one and red, orange and yellow colours on the other; the whole illusion art is held in place by a line of fishing wire. It is basically made of these materials: wax, lacquered wood, cotton thread and some pigments. Interplay is meant to resemble sunlight streaming through a morning mist/dewdrops and/or an afternoon sun shower on a hot summers day. The contrast of the warm and cool colors helps in the making of developing this illusion.===

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Her thoughts for this artwork:
===//“With this work I’m trying to explore space, color, composition, balance. I’ve been working with this material, beeswax and thread, for a while now. Most of them are suspended pieces so gravity is a huge part in how they take shape. But here I am trying to do something else, where gravity doesn’t have such a big role. It’s not the gravity that gives it the shape, it’s the tension. I wanted to make it more playful, like its almost there floating or treading softly on the floor.”//===

//Touch Me Not//
===Touch Me Not was made in 2006-2007. The Main materials used to make it were beeswax and steel pins. Craftsmen had to individually drill 13,000 beads into the wall in the pattern of the illusion wanted. While this was going on, Shettar had to stay in Melbourne for a month with her husband who is an artist, to see that all was going well and as planned. It is meant to pour out of the wall and bring its own life. Touch Me Not is meant to resemble a plant; the steel like points symbolise a plant that has many tiny leaves that, when brushed up against or affected by the wind, are drawn inward.===

//Heliotropes//
===Heliotropes is a linear artfrom that has been sewn together and molded from latex. This model has been suspended from the wall to look as if they are stretching towards the light coming from the window that is next to it. It has the appearence that it is swimming out of the wall like fish and reaching like a hand towards the light. It is meant to have the illusion of a plant and its reaction to the sunlight. It is an organic model that is also made (apart from the materials above) of straw and mud that has been pressed upon roles of steel mesh to create vessels and/or nests of life. Heliotropes can also resemble a living organism; part plant and part animal structure etc. This model relies on the background to show its organic rawness.===

//Fire In The Belly//
===Fire In The Belly is made of acacia wood that has been painted with automotive paint and is suspended from the ceiling. The shapes are odd and tear dropped, there are various sizes but the color is the same with every one of them. Shettar believes that it will start to crack in time and the paint will begin to flake; all of this will happen because of the untreated acacia wood. The artwork is meant to resemble the fluorescent green light that glows from the abdomen of fireflies.===

//Flame Of The Forest//
===Flame Of The Forest is meant to resemble a tree that is found in India named 'flame of the forest'. The tree's appearance is a dark brown trunk with bright orange and crimson flowers. It metaphorically produces fire because of the color of the flowers. It is made of untreated wood that has been lacquered and lacquered orb-like shapes. Inside the teak wood wheel there are many orange nodules that resemble flowers and flame.===



//Transitions//
===Transitions is one of Ranjani's arts that includes biology, cells and microbes. Each item on the structure has a meaning connecting to science. The orange seeds that are called gulaganji are meant to resemble the cellular nuclei. Transitions is made up of automotive paint and wood that is suspended by a line of fishing wire. Transitions is meant to be as a metamorphosis or cells undergoing reproduction.===

===//‘I was trying to float forms in thin air, at least virtually, using fishing line… suspending heavy wood, each on a string by itself, created a dynamism to the whole composition. There is an element of chance in how you see the sculpture, in terms of how it positions itself in space according to movement of air in the space’.//===





===The Ian Potter Gallery is full of inspirational art that anyone can enter and experience. It used to have an illusion section in the upstairs temporary exhibit but the section was removed before I started this project. I was very sad to hear this and had been looking forward to see what kinds of illusions they had to offer. I had heard there was a melting mask illusion and really wanted to see it but now that it is gone and over, I will show you two illusion arts that are outside that exhibition.===

//Untitiled//
===Untitled is an oil canvas painting that was made by the artist Dale Hickey, who was born in the year 1937. The canvas art illusion was completed in 1968 but was started in 1967. It is known to be the measurments of 172.6 x 172.6 cm and the shape is part of the illusion/artwork. This work is based on the reduction of normal/ordinary objects turning into geometrical patterns therefore making the illusion of the squares popping out or in, another way of saying it is that it turns 3D. It is given life and changes from boring and flat to full of life and depth. It is based on an concept that has been further investigated on another concept (eiderdown), like many of the other artworks of the time period of this time. The artsist had used this process from 1967 - 1970.===

//Documents From A Banner Marching Project//
===Documents From A Banner Marching Band was made in the time period of 2004-2007 by a man named Tom Nicholson. There is not much information on this artwork and I am sad to say that the illusion journey for the National Gallery Of Victoria and Ian Potter is now over. The tour is at an end and the gallery is closed.===