Photo Australia and James Makin Gallery are pleased to invite you to the opening of New Photographers, PHOTO 2022's showcase of Victoria's most exciting emerging photographers, featuring seven artists who bring new perspectives to the human experience, photography and visual culture.
New Photographers includes work by Isabella Darcy, J Davies, João Marco Deloie, Rachel Main, Olivia Mròz, Jake Nemirovsky and Jahkarli Romanis.
Currently exhibiting as a part of New Photographers is Olivia Mroz, who presents work from her series Viscous.
Mroz' artist statement presented here sheds generous light into the conceptual and literal makings of this body of work.
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If being abject is distant, is other, is not something normative society wishes to face, then weaponising that abjection, emphasising it and making it impossible to ignore, is a radical act. We wear the abject like an armour, refusing respectability politics and the normalising process. In this work, the abject becomes
personal and weaponised. (Shields, 2016)
My self-reflexive practice examines themes surrounding queerness, sex, identity, and the interconnectedness of the emotional state and trauma. Manipulating my figures through layers of distortion and erasure, my works highlight sexual empowerment as a means of self-affirmation, self-
repair and liberation. In speaking to embodied trauma and celebrating acceptance, the collaging components in my work connect to structural dissociation and parts psychology. Parts psychology is also known as parts-work-therapy or integrated family systems, the goal of which is to achieve trauma
resolution by recognising disowned parts, younger parts and sub-personalities, by giving these parts a
voice.
Editing my artworks on my phone is an important aspect of my process. This instant access to this digital
tactile environment allows me to be casual about my process and enter flow state whenever I need. It acts as a way of unpacking, as a way of grounding, regulating and merging parts, as a way of growing, learning, nourishing and stimulating.