Innovative artworks, photography: ARTiculations by Jude Tulloch
This month I’m drawing a line in the sand. It’s down to work completing artworks for Noosa Open Studios. The garage (my workspace) and art room will be open for two long-weekends on October 1-3 and 8-10.
On 17 February 2019, two days after Theresa May’s Government had been defeated for the second time on her Brexit deal with the EU, journalist Tom Peck wrote an article in The Independent on the British Prime Minister. Peck likened her to the rugged Nokia 5210, a shock proof, water-resistant mobile phone that was renowned for its indestructibility.
She is indestructible. She is the cockroach in nuclear winter. She is the algae that survives on sulphuric gas from sub-aquatic volcanoes, seven miles beneath the daylight. She is the Nokia 5210.
Tom Peck The Independent, January 17, 2019
Fascinated by this I looked up the Nokia 5210 and started reading old reviews from 2002. Bizarre as it seemed, the journalist had hit on something that resonated: the words used to describe phone in the reviews somehow seemed to speak of Theresa May and the political situation.
I used some of these words in the digitally-designed postcards. Another element, the unusually shaped “on” “off” buttons of the Nokia phone, suggested people shouting; they represent the “yes” “no” protests seen daily in the press at that time.
After two more defeats, May proved not to be indestructible, resigning on May 24, 2019.
Meanwhile mobiles have come a long way since the fabulously retro orange Nokia 5210, Peck’s quote, no doubt forgotten by most, has been buried by the 24 hour new cycle, and postcards are fast becoming a nostalgic thing the past.
I made the space at the Kaya Sulc Studio feel like home. Mum gave me the piece of fabric draped across the chair many years ago. It’s a sarong she bought back from a holiday. Having my paintings all around and a flowering indoor plant reminded me of mum. I grew up with indoor plants, a native garden and art on every wall.
