Jo Roszkowski-
Title : Obliterated
Medium: Watercolour and mixed media on paper
Price : AUD 100
National Graphic
1953
Volume CIII
Number One
About the artwork:
The illustrated image from National Geographic, January 1953 is one of Yellow Winged Sugarbirds. The information was fairly scant but compared them to hummingbirds. They are found in South America. The females are “drab looking” according to the article and they make a “feeble ‘quit-quit’” sound. The tone of the article seemed light and flippant to me in an age where so many species are gone or about to be extinct. Did they have no way of knowing what impact humanity would have on the creatures of this planet? This lead me to make a depiction of a select few of the birds in the picture, male and female. What started out as an x-ray view of the skeleton of one of the birds soon developed into a layer of covering up, the birds receding into the background and the white lines becoming a trivial, superficial screen obliterating the birds and perhaps distancing us from the issues at hand. They are no longer in their natural environment but find themselves in a strange, constructed stage. They ” have long been bred in captivity, but raising them is not easy.”
About Jo:
Jo Roszkowski works in a variety of media including ceramics, textiles, encaustic, mixed media and painting. As with all of her creative output, this body of current work is inspired by the forms, colours and textures of nature, in particular the unseen layers and the ephemeral details that form the greater universe. The ongoing engagement with these elements and the immediacy of the technique attempts to evoke the changing nature of the natural world while providing homage to the fleeting passage of seasonal and generational change. In particular the painting medium has provided an opportunity to explore layers of meaning; what is hidden and what is revealed. At this time of global crisis there is also evidence of a conversation going on between the land and humanity. Jo is a Melbourne based artist who has studied photography, visual arts and therapeutic arts therapy. She was selected for the Bayside Artist in Residence program at Billilla in 2016, and has been an artist in residence at Kingston Arts in 2017 – 2019. Her work has recently been exhibited at Altman Gallery, No Vacancy, G3, Incub8r and the South Art Dealer in New York. Her work is included in the Benetton art collection Imago Mundi, Italy as well as other private and online art collections.