Georgia Clemson

Press release for ‘The Crook of the Elbow and other islands’, part of ‘Common Ground’ at ArtLacuna May-June 2022

How is a boundary created? What is the law inside your territory? Who is welcome, and what behaviour is unacceptable? These are questions being asked in ‘The Crook of the Elbow and other islands’ by Georgia Clemson.

In this work, Clemson explores the layered meaning of the word boundary, and draws a parallel between the limits of a geographical territory, the skin as the body’s border and the invisible boundaries that we draw to protect our emotional selves. Clemson posits that the boundaries of the body and inner self can be breached, trespassed on, contested and guarded like the border of a nation. The boundaries that each of us creates for ourselves have an impact not only on our relationships with other people, but also with work, technology and media. 

Using negative spaces and shapes taken from a human body, abstracted into an archipelago of forms, she creates an abstract map of the emotional world from experimental photographic techniques and collage. The visual ‘cartography’ is accompanied by an audioguide, narrated by an unnamed ‘explorer’. We join the explorer as they navigate a new world that they have discovered and named ‘Another’, hoping to claim it as their own. Through their voice we encounter the flora, climate and terrain, and join them as they toe the line between respectful guest and unwanted interloper.