AustLit

Work in Focus:

Title: Possible Histories: Valley Nights 2008

Date of Production: 2008

Series: Possible Histories

Series Date: 2007-2008

Medium: Oil on linen

Technique:

Cattapan's images begin with photographs that are scanned, digitally assembled and composed on computer in the studio to form preliminary concept drawings. These are arranged within a panoptic view.

This large-scale work was prepared over many months, incorporating both local Brisbane and Cattapan’s own subjective elements. He uses a type of collaging process of printed images, interspersed and overlaid by paint and modified additives including alkalyd resins. These are applied both by hand and brush.

Edition: N/A

Catalogue raisonne: N/A

Dimensions: Four parts, each 190x170cm

Inscriptions: Nil

Condition of Work: Original, pristine.

Provenance:

The artist developed this work during his residency with Queensland College of Art, Griffith University, and Griffith Artworks in 2008. It was unveiled as a major new work at the culmination of this period. From 4-16 October 2008 it was exhibited at the Dell Gallery at Queensland College of Art, Griffith University and subsequently purchased by the University of Queensland Art Museum in 2009. It was later exhibited in that Museum’s “Story Bridge” exhibition from 9 July to 18 September 2011.

Credit Line: Purchased by the University of Queensland Art Museum.

Accession no: 2009.04a

Copyright Line: Usual copyright laws apply

Descriptive Text:

Possible Histories: Valley Nights was completed during his residency with Queensland College of Art, Griffith University in 2008 and was Jon Cattapan’s largest work to that date . This is a mid career and transitional work, produced just before his period as a war artist and showing connections with his earlier Submerged series . This work provides a strong statement that reflects Cattapan’s central and ongoing interest in urban spaces.

Prepared over four large panels, this work features significant Brisbane motif’s such as the Story Bridge, McWhirter’s Building and the elegant preserved frame of the decommissioned Newstead Gasometer. These are observed from Cattapan’s preferred panoptic perspective and are accompanied by small outlined figures that are dominated by the prevailing immensity and power of their context. With their hollowed form, fluid features and animated poses, these figures capture the style created earlier in the decade by Cattapan in his Carbon Group drawings .

Through his use of collage, multi-layered paint process and nocturnal light, this work provides an impression of texture, depth and substance. This is amplified by his choice of colour palette. Here, Cattapan uses the blue of the river to provide a unifying meander between the panels. He then liberally applies vibrant red to dominate the mood of the work, offset in part by lush green and touches of yellow against a dark indigo evening sky. These colours not only evoke Brisbane’s sub-tropical climate but also the emotional backdrop of the notorious and seedy nightclub world of Fortitude Valley.

While evidently local in his choice of icons, Cattapan’s depiction more broadly denotes every city’s alternate lifestyle “valley”, with their inherent social and political undertones . Further though, the sweeping hazes of colour and light-studded cityscape that envelop the river remind the spectator of Cattapan’s frequent themes. In particular, this work recalls some of the psychological urban deluge from his earlier 1990’s Submerged series. That is, we are awash with transmissions, possibilities and the many agendas that swirl in the urban world.

It is in this challenged space that Cattapan’s subjects attempt to negotiate their urban territory. From Cattapan’s perspective, this territory is a nocturnal, multilayered space, influenced somewhat by film noir and the many attendant possibilities of dark, brooding narratives.

In this fraught space it seems likely that Cattapan shows some of the subjectivity drawn from his young migrant experiences. More broadly though, it surreptitiously propels the spectator into a politicised space with urban undertones of disadvantage, pending violence and despair. Cattapan delivers a lively and colourful vista as the opening scene, but with closer examination then reveals the many contextual social challenges of this particular urban territory.

Within his complex, yet still cohesive composition, Cattapan also adds various small and nuanced motifs, such as skulls and hearts. These demonstrate the subject figure’s badges for tribal attachment as well as a light touch of irony.

Overall, like many of Cattapan’s works, Valley Nights is a highly energetic yet graceful story about the negotiation of complex urban territory by its inhabitants. It is also a poetic social narrative about some of Cattapan’s human concerns that undoubtedly also concern us.