(SC)OOT(ER)ING around | SU SAN COHN & Euge­nia Raskopoulos

An exhi­bi­tion of new and exist­ing works by Su san Cohn, craft artist and Euge­nia Raskopou­los, visu­al artist, curat­ed by Vic­to­ria Lynn and pre­sent­ed at Tar­rawar­ra Muse­um of Art from 3 August – 10 Novem­ber 2024.

The human body wears lived expe­ri­ence both on its skin, and with­in. It express­es the cul­tur­al, sex­u­al, racial and diverse geo­graph­ic expe­ri­ences of indi­vid­u­als. Aus­tralian artists Su san Cohn and Euge­nia Raskopou­los have explored the human body, often specif­i­cal­ly female, for decades.

Adorn­ment has an ancient his­to­ry, and its rela­tion to the body is dec­o­ra­tive, sym­bol­ic of gen­der, sta­tus, spir­i­tu­al and cul­tur­al beliefs. Su san Cohn’s work con­sid­ers the role of jew­ellery in the pol­i­tics of soci­ety: as gift, sym­bol, memo­r­i­al, and as a com­mu­ni­ca­tion and sen­so­ry tool. Her work often responds to cur­rent issues, such as war, the plight of refugees and peace-making.

Through pho­tog­ra­phy, video and neon, Euge­nia Raskopou­los has used her own sto­ry of trans­mi­gra­tion as a touch­stone for a tex­tu­al explo­ration of the body. As an artist liv­ing between two lan­guages, she cre­ates bod­i­ly actions and images, often inter­wo­ven with neon text, in Greek, Eng­lish and bina­ry code. Her work con­sid­ers a rup­tured body, one that is not eas­i­ly defined, or trans­lat­ed, and that defies what we expect of the female form.

Each artist is inter­est­ed in how our bod­ies express social and cul­tur­al expe­ri­ence. Their approach aris­es from their per­son­al lived expe­ri­ences and age­ing bod­ies and does not ​‘stand in’ for a broad­er con­cept of the female form. In the con­text of the shift­ing med­ical, tech­no­log­i­cal and social impli­ca­tions for the human body in first world con­texts, and the mis­treat­ment of human beings across the world, they cre­ate art works that express the call for a more eth­i­cal corporeality.

While the exhi­bi­tion includes sev­er­al new works by each artist, it is con­ceived as an artis­tic col­lab­o­ra­tion between the two artists and the cura­tor. It is a dia­logue, one that has result­ed in the final work in the exhi­bi­tion, ​‘Word of Mouth’, an actu­al col­lab­o­ra­tive instal­la­tion made by Cohn and Raskopoulos.

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