Country Arts SA pays respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and recognises their continuing connection and spiritual relationship to these lands, waters and skies. We are committed to listening and helping care for Country, and to safeguard, share and celebrate First Nations’ living cultures.
About
Finite Bounty is an exhibition of paintings by Adelaide-based artist Dan Withey exploring the theme of animism (the belief that objects, sacred places, animals, and natural phenomena possess a distinct spiritual essence).
Anthropomorphic creatures, strange characters, animals, rainbows, magical happenings, and landscapes come-to-life to inhabit Withey’s fantastical world, which is rendered in his signature illustrative, playful and imaginative style. In this body of work Withey dismantles hierarchical boundaries between human, animal, plant, landscape and inanimate object.
His worlds are imbued with a magic that asks us to consider what unknown secrets a mountain or a flower or a spider’s web might know that we don’t. Visual metaphor, puns, and absurd scenes point to the strangeness of contemporary life, as a way for Withey to poke fun at his own existential angst through a humorous irreverent attitude.
Finite Bounty represents a stylistic departure for Withey, with a looser more expressive approach exploding onto the canvas to fill the composition with expressive mark making and patterning which Withey uses to build complex compositions that jostle with life and vibrancy.
Calendar
Transaction fees apply: Online $2.50 – Counter/Phone $3.50
Education Resource
The education resource has been designed to support students to build confidence in looking at and thinking and talking about Dan Withey’s exhibition Finite Bounty.
The following education resource to is aligned to the Australian Curriculum 9.0 with activities that
- provide ideas and prompts to support teaching and learning before and after attending the Dan Withey exhibition – Finite Bounty
- can be adapted to extend the knowledge and understanding of students depending on their age and abilities.
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