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Screen Test

New screen print works on paper by Martin James, Alex Lewis and Rebecca Stapledon

6 - 27 July 2014 Opening 6pm, 10 July 2014

Megalo Print Studio + Gallery, 21 Wentworth Avenue, Kingston, Also online at screen-test.net and Facebook

Contact the artists and find out more at their websites: Martin James Alex Lewis Rebecca Stapledon

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Screen Test

“Welcome to the Lagom LCD monitor test pages. With the test images on these pages, you can easily adjust the settings of your monitor to get the best possible picture quality…”1 A screen test is also a method of determining the suitability of an actor for a performance in a particular role. The latter definition was the first to spring to mind when asked to write for the bodies of work that Alex Lewis, Rebecca Stapledon and Martin James have developed for exhibition at Megalo.

Both definitions are apt – referring to trial and error, testing in order to get the best fit, exploring variables and their configuration in order to get the most successful outcome. Screen Test also implies a particularly appealing quality - a notion that there are an infinite range of possibilities and outcomes in any print based endeavor, particularly screenprinting. One’s whole artistic life could be dedicated to screen testing – what a great solution for the need for that next “new” idea.

There is a diversity of ideas and outputs from these three young artists. Their image making is derived from extremely different sources and their outputs have an individual look and feel. The images which they produce span the breadth of potential for the screenprint technique. There are crisp architectural renderings which are flat and diagrammatic. There are densely layered abstract fields of colour and mark which are expressive and apparently textured. There are confronting images using photographic source material and text, testing the juxtaposition of elements from different historical periods and contexts to create political messages relevant to the present social climate.

Alex Lewis has been pursuing his interest in architectural and engineering systems for a while now, using a range of materials and formats including 3D polymer printing, lithography and etching. Screenprinting enables Alex to activate the visual language of diagrams and plans and reproduce his digitally devised structures in a clearly graphic outcome. He explores the potential of stair-like structures (which are impossible to realise in the world we inhabit) to create visual conundrums. He presents forms that are crisply delineated, floating on a clean plane of pale blue so that the strangeness of the form jumps out from the background. We are presented with a small selection of these ideal forms which cannot be physically experienced – stairways to nowhere; endless Escher-like entwining forms that present as visual puzzles and can be interpreted as psychological analogues or more simply as strange 3D possibilities. The paste-up version of Alex’s project is used to test the solidity of the Megalo building as a playful counterpoint to the more serious suite of framed prints in the gallery.

Rebecca Stapledon’s work might give a nod to structures within the built environment but the mark, the gesture, the rhythms and attendant mood that develops in her often densely worked and reworked shapes are much more in line with an exploration of embodiment, sensing and feeling. In Rebecca’s visual language the mark is the crucial unit – and it is repeated, layered, erased, made again as she develops fields of line and colour in screenprinted versions of her ongoing drawing project. A sense of touch is predominant in these works – the rhythm, ebb and flow of layers of coloured marks lead us to imagine the artist struggling to go beyond the simple surface of a form, or a rendering of a structure or landscape to get at an essence of something. I am reminded of Giacometti, drawing, erasing, drawing, erasing as his patient subjects sat day in and day out while he searched for an interior truth. There is such a quality in Rebecca’s work, which is compelling on different scales too – intense in the smaller pieces, a more meandering pondering of possibility in the larger pieces. Screenprinting allows her to successfully (perhaps endlessly) test colour variations, opacity and transparency, solidity and evanescence.

Martin’s imagery, often derived from film, television, advertising and the infinite research library of the internet makes no apology for a harsh critique of contemporary politics and the sort of subtle (and not so subtle) corruption of the ideals of egalitarianism and equity that we would like to hold dear. In 1925 photomontage was described by Laszlo Moholy-Nagy as “…. an experimental method of simultaneous representation; compressed interpenetration of visual and verbal with weird combinations of the most realistic, imitative means which pass into imaginary spheres…”2 This depiction of photomontage is a good description of both Martin’s intention and output. He engineers and assembles his images and words from fragments which are derived from different sources. His images confront the bigotry and complacence that are an intrinsic aspect of Australian middle class life. And in this suite of prints our easy acceptance of noble and heroic myths is put to the test. There isn’t really any aspect of our social attitudes, politics or desire for material security which is exempt from Martin’s critical gaze.

Three artists, three Screen Tests, three successful auditions of the screenprinting medium. The medium stands up to the test and is shown to be adaptable, relevant and full of potential for future directions.

Patsy Payne June 2014

1 Second on the page of results for the web search of “screen test” 2 p 19 Photography in Printmaking; Charles Newton; Victoria and Albert Museum; 1979

» Website of Patsy Payne

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Rebecca Stapledon

Untitled, 2014 Screen print  76 x 57 cm $200 Unique state

Rebecca Stapledon in Screen Test

View website

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Rebecca Stapledon

Untitled, 2014 Screen print  76 x 57 cm $200 Unique state

Rebecca Stapledon in Screen Test

View website

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Rebecca Stapledon

Untitled, 2014 Screen print  76 x 57 cm $200 Unique state

Rebecca Stapledon in Screen Test

View website

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Rebecca Stapledon

Untitled, 2014 Screen print  71 x 58 cm $200 Unique state

Rebecca Stapledon in Screen Test

View website

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Martin James

Hancock, 2014 Screen print 59 x 41 cm $100 Edition of 7

Martin James in Screen Test

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Martin James

Fortescue, 2014 Screen print  59 x 41 cm $100 Edition of 7

Martin James in Screen Test

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Martin James

A call from the Dardanelles, 2014 Screen print 57 x 76 cm $200

Martin James in Screen Test

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Martin James

Fall in, 2014 Screen print 59 x 84 cm $200

Martin James in Screen Test

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Martin James

Australia has promised Britain, 2014 Screen print 59 x 84 cm $200

Martin James in Screen Test

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Alex Lewis

Return, 2014 Screen print 76 x 56 cm $150 unframed/$400 framed Edition of 5

Alex Lewis in Screen Test

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Alex Lewis

The stairs, 2014 Screen print 76 x 56 cm $150 unframed/$400 framed Edition of 5

Alex Lewis in Screen Test

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Alex Lewis

Climbing, 2014 Screen print 76 x 56 cm $150 unframed/$400 framed Edition of 5

Alex Lewis in Screen Test

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Alex Lewis

Möbius, 2014 Screen print 76 x 56 cm $150 unframed/$400 framed Edition of 5

Alex Lewis in Screen Test

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Alex Lewis

Intrusion, 2014 Screen print 76 x 56 cm $150 unframed/$400 framed Edition of 5

Alex Lewis in Screen Test

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Martin James

Notable quotables by Tony Abbott, 2012 Screen print on neoprene Dimensions variable $25

Martin James in Screen Test

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