absence presence installation cockatoo island

absence presence
A site-specific performance & moving image installation infused with the resonance and mystery of what we feel but cannot see. It is a meditation on space and memory and the ways in which the two
constantly interact at specific sites. Composing filmic worlds moving between the abandoned architecture
of Cockatoo Island and the remote
australian bush and how this collision of built and natural worlds can mediate between the present and the past – between the visible and the invisible. Rooms with suspended female bodies, veiled and lit in a sensuous light, conjuring emotions of sadness, loss, loneliness and reverie and yet a gentle sense of security and of our own stilled existence within the incredible space where we find ourselves.. on an uninhabited abandoned island that is richly embedded with the history
of our colonial and distant past.

"The installation was intended to be a highly experiential encounter with the space and with oneself. For the viewer to experience their own sense of the space and find themselves in a world between worlds…blurred between interior and exterior realms of built and natural spaces and the interior and exterior states of mind that the
performance and the soundscape allude to…. Above all it was to be
enjoyed and to be taken on a journey to a faraway place…"
Lara O'Reilly artist