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Failed leisure

Curated by Andrea Bell

Adam Rozsa, Heather Lighton, Clare Redenbach

5th July – 21st July 2007

Gallery One

 

The pursuit of leisure is characterized by escape and possibility, but so often these desires remain unfulfilled. Drawing from this uncertainty and ambivalence, three Melbourne artists examine their disillusionment with the paradoxical nature and meaninglessness of our recreational endeavours. 

Editions

We may be post-modernist, post-object, post-feminist, post-colonial, post humanist but not yet post failure1

Failed Leisure examines the poetics of leisure and perceptions of failure. Leisure exists in popular discourse as a utopic space of authentic experience. Yet the actual way leisure is experienced often falls short of this ideal. The more we psychologically invest in leisure, the more we risk disappointment. Increasingly, ‘in much of our leisure experience we are unsure whether we are satisfied or not.’2

A parallel can be drawn between this uncertainty and the flight of a kite. Some might see kite flying as nostalgic activity- longing for childhood, or for a time when everything in life appeared to be simple. However, lamenting the past also brings to light an unfulfilling present. In a similar way the actual act of flying a kite may fall short of our expectations. Perhaps kite-flying symbolically demonstrates the lack of control we hold over our own leisure activities. Here we are faced with the potential of failure, aware deep down that the forces of nature are beyond our control. Yet, despite this uncertainty, still we try. Maybe there is something romantic in our futile aspirations of escape. For freedom is the essence of leisure. Adam Rozsa is interested in the unsuccessful outcomes of our recreational endeavours. Like the tangled strings that trail behind a kite, our failed attempts at escape leave us tied up in knots. Paradoxically, being caught up in these moments of entanglement can lead to an unravelling. It is in these moments that we come face to face with the fundamental ambivalence of postmodern subjectivity.

The postmodern mediascape provides the space for much of contemporary leisure activity. With all the convenience of technology, i-pods bring with them a flaneur-like foray into consumerism and media interactivity. More than just a mere Marxist critique of commodity fetishism3, Clare Redenbach’s work iLove also has nostalgic overtones. The pastel hues of the felt i-pods call to mind memories of treasured soft toys, analogous to the comforts of our childhood and the things we desire as grown ups. However, pining for something that we possessed in our youth cannot be gratified by consumption. The fetish object is doomed to fail, and can only serve as a temporary forestalling of an inevitably unsatisfiable desire.

For many an increasing source of leisure is the entertainment industry. Perhaps those most well-known for living a life of leisure are Hollywood celebrities. Although we are often critical of the level of media attention devoted to scandal and to those who are ‘famous just for being famous,’ these stars and their dramas form a backdrop to many idle moments of leisure. Rather than scrutinising the latest starlets adorning the covers of New Weekly, Heather Lighton is more interested in the flipside of our throwaway tabloid culture- those who have fallen out of favour with the paparazzi, and who have been shoved out of the spotlight. Demonstrating ‘how one girl’s trash is another girl’s treasure’, her work acts as a shrine of sorts to failed celebrities. Perhaps she is also critical of the way personalities can be momentarily created by the media before they are written off, only to exist as fictional characters in our memories.

The pursuit of leisure is characterized by escape and possibility, but so often these desires remain unfulfilled. Drawing attention to a wider failure engendered by our mediated lives, these artists reflect on a collective failure to be human in a world where we are cut off from each other, and where any meaningful form of social participation is replaced by an endless leisurely distraction with no assured outcome. Sparked by this uncertainty and ambivalence Adam Rozsa, Heather Lighton and Clare Redenbach examine their disillusionment with the paradoxical nature and potential meaninglessness in our recreational endeavours. As such, their work is anything but a failure, or mere leisure activity.

Andrea Bell

 

Endnotes:

Juliette Peers, ‘Brilliant failure? Historical and cultural perspectives on the shifting aesthetics of failure in Australia’ from Failure: Dialogue number 10, Westspace, 1998.

Chris Rojek, Decentring Leisure: Rethinking Leisure Theory, Sage Publications, London, 1995, p.1

 

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