Tracy Luff

“Rising Tension”

18 May – 28 June 2008

“Before we can undo a knot, we must first loosen it to understand its structure; pulling on it only makes it tighter.  More knots take more time and effort.” – Tracy Luff

Tracy has created this site-specific installation for SLOT to coincide with the opening of the 2008 Biennale of Sydney picking up on the event’s theme ‘Revolution - Forms that Turn.’  She says “The link between my installation and the biennale theme can best be described by the phrase “Tension causes revolution”. 
Using layers of cardboard discs that twist and turn to form a series of over-sized knots floating in the space, Tracy creates this tension by playing with our perceptions of scale, fragility and material. She recycles found cardboard to construct her forms, giving them another layer of meaning or purpose, almost like geological striations that densely compact history, time and place.
Engaging with Tracy’s work, one feels compelled to want to touch them. As Tracy explains, “Through the medium of cardboard, I explore the human condition. As the cardboard box is a container, so are my vessels containers of memories and life experiences. As I cut through the skin of the cardboard to reveal its inner texture, they suggest a revelation of self, cutting into inner emotions and thoughts. As each object is formed by many layers, so too is the story of life multi-layered.”
What is most surprising about Tracy’s cardboard urns, and here knots, is that they throw our perceptions of weight.  They question how we value objects and materials in our consumer society of excess and show how a simple material can energise a space with dancing shadows and lines. Sometimes it is the simplest things in life that charm the most. 
With this site-specific work Tracy draws on the age-old tradition of maritime knots. Bound by sea, Australia’s heritage is based in maritime connection – first Aboriginal trading with the Macassars, then a British colony, immigration and today’s preoccupation with boarder territories. These tensions through time – metaphorically expressed here as a suite of knots, each one individual and yet part of a collective group – goes beyond the mere simplicity of their material cardboard.
These are intelligent, elegant and adroit sculptures.
Based in Goulburn in regional New South Wales, Tracy is of Chinese Malaysian heritage.  She migrated to Australian in 1985 and only starting making art in 1996 as a mature student.

Review of Luffs’ exhibition by Prue Gibson in World Sculpture News 1.5 Mb