Season 4, Episode 6, London

David Attwood

Season 4 Episode 6 presents new works by Perth/Boorloo based artist David Attwood. Known for assembling deft combinations of contemporary commodities, the works on show continue Attwood’s interests in housework, its labour conditions and the sculptural potential of its associated appliances, technologies and consumables. Particular to this presentation for Art-o-rama is the globally iconic Red Bull energy drink, which is used to explore ideas around energy, productivity, performance and work.

 

For More Work For Mother, a suite of free standing sculptures, the Red Bull can label has been reproduced and affixed to discarded vacuum cleaners rods. Resembling aluminum cans that have been impossibly stretched upwards, the chrome rods stand scattered throughout the exhibition space.

 

In the wall-based assemblage Untitled, a Scrub Daddy ‘caddy’ (a peculiar spin-off product of the well-known smiling Scrub Daddy sponge) is fixed to a pane of glass. The cavities of the protruding caddy’s ‘eyes’ have been filled with powdered taurine, the active ingredient in Red Bull. As if its pupils were dilated, the caddy’s face appears in a state of frenzy.

 

Through wall-based and freestanding sculpture, Attwood playfully yet poignantly conflates the auratic qualities of Red Bull with products of domestic maintenance, pitting the idealisation of energy consumption against the realities of its expenditure.

https://season4episode6.rodeo/