Meet Lucy Barker
Barker’s sculptural practice draws on observations of social change, particularly as a result of digital transformation. Play and materiality are vital part of her creative process and her means of connecting a concept with the audience.
Barker has exhibited with Sculpture By The Sea eleven times since 2009; nine times in Bondi and twice in Cottesloe and is a regular in other local sculpture prizes including, Woollahra, North Sydney and Sawmillers. She has works in public and private collections both nationally and internationally.
Exhibiting Sculpture
What Once Was: The Future Tense Edition
This installation is a collection of sandstone works created between 2012 – 2016 when I looked at the human side of the digital revolution and the social impact of technology. I chose to work in sandstone due to the ancient character and historic symbolism of the material, which I wanted to juxtapose with the subject matter.
Each element of the installation is an oversized replica of a technological device (or glyph); an iPhone4S, iPod shuffle, iPad3, a magic mouse and Macbook Pro, a web cam, and two, two faced emojis. The pieces are installed protruding from the ground like headstones of an old burial site or debris from an ancient rubbish dump.
The work questions how closely our life and identity have become connected to these devices, and what aspects of us have been lost, killed off, or handed over, in the process. The work tells a prophetic tale of impending doom via contemporary glyphs and devices etched in the ruins of a lost civilisation. As the viewer moves amongst the familiar technological totems there is a playfully menacing sense of a lost civilisation where past and future merge into the present.
Although these pieces were made between 2012 & 2016 they are even more relevant today than they were then, and aptly appropriate for their new setting at the quarantine station where they represent the disease of our time.
Dimensions: 300 x 350 x 70cm
Materials: Sandstone
Price: Between $1,500 and $2,500
Installation
Check for Pixel Rash
A symptom excessive digital technology use, Pixel Rash is characterised by a preference of representations over the real thing. Fragmented and flat, detached, distorted and disconnected; this rash glistens like a shining jewel.
Dimensions: 10 x 1.5 x 0.1m
Materials: Acrylic, Timber
Price: NFS