Rui Matsunga - Heathen Threshold
(with. Tim Parr, Ruth Uglow and Sarah Dwyer)
7 July - 1 August 2006

In an era dominated by rationalism and scientific modernity, the artists in Heathen Threshold reclaim forbidden knowledge to see the world through the illumination of shamanism, animism, folklore, fables and ancient mythologies. Through dreaming reverie, they seek to re-possess the terrain and unearth strange and microscopic encounters coalescing with heathen passages, where individuals worship forbidden old divinities in wastelands and wild places. What they each share is an emotive connection to nature, where they find wonder, magic and romantic trancendence.

Rui Matsunga: Rui Matsunaga sources figurative imagery from magazines, the Internet and photography for paintings. Drawing inspiration from Manga (Japanese cartoon and comics) and ancient mythology she exaggerates the tension between reality and fiction to transmute figures into shamans, witches, nympths and oracles existing in an otherworld of the magical and spiritual. In an increasingly technologised era contemporary and ancient mythologies blur in and out of existence which Matsunaga captures in her paintings so that we can contemplate our multi-dimensional and shifting realities.

Omajinai II 2005. Ink, pencil and charcoal on paper, 42 x 59.4 cm