Animation

With this creative response I have taken the lecture from Week 6 - Three views of suburbia: place, colour, materiality by Dr Simon Crosbie, and have focused on his analysis of the works of John Brack in relation with Melbourne suburbia. 

Dr Crosbie states in the lecture something along the lines of the anti suburban sentiment by Australian Artist has grown tired and that we should reduce the art we create around that idea. I took that as a challenge.

 

 I was inspired to create a short animation from Brack’s work around the commute from the suburbs, linking back to my own experience of the commute to work in the CBD, the ideas of urbanism and the 15-minute city. Also around burn out and being forced to be participant in a capitalist society against your will.  

Growing up within the ‘baby boom’ in the newly created suburbs, Brack created work around the anonymity of ordinary life. Working as an insurance clerk, he would of commuted down or near Collins St, feeling like just another number, another cog in the machine, walking along and with the mass of faceless people also on their way to work. My place of work is also along Collins St, 5pm on Collin St has always been a painting that evoked those same feelings while in the sea of commuters.  

 

With this animation I wanted to convey the feeling of unending days, repeating, your only break is in sleep, that gets interrupted as soon as it starts by the shrill of an alarm. The commute from place to place takes up more and more of your precious time, as car congestion worsens. No end to the 9 to 5, no energy to live as the climate worsens around you,

worsened by the one thing that takes up your time, commute, work commute, consume, repeat.  

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John Brack’s Paintings in order of appearance

Self-portrait 1955, Oil on Canvas

The Breakfast Table 1958, Oil on Canvas

The Car 1955 Oil on Canvas

Subdivision 1954, Oil on Canvas

Collins St, 5p.m 1955, Oil on Canvas