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Aaron Christopher Rees Interview - The Hopper Prize

Aaron Christopher Rees

Aaron Christopher Rees discusses the phenomological experience of seeing, playing with allegory, abstraction & symbolism, & the meditive nature embedded in the physical act of making.

How did you get into making art?

I have always engaged in art making in some form or other from a very young age, but never took it seriously as a career or life path.

Around the age of 17 I taught myself photography as a hobby and carried through experimenting with image making into adult life. I had been a screenprinter and than had a career as a chef before I finally decided I should purse eduation at a fine arts university.

What are you currently working on?

I just embarked on making a suite of photographic prints, for a print based solo exhibition coming up next year, It will be the first time I have shown only prints in a solo exhibition, generally my exhibitions centre around AV installtions.

I’m very much still in the experimental proccess of gestating the works, and it feels refreshing to step away from editing video or solving technical issues around installations and AV, whislt still remaining true to my expanded photographic practice.

My work has always loosly navigated what I would refer to as, the phenomological experience of seeing, or 'Altered states of Vision,' in the past this has navigated performance, drones, stereoscopic vision, cameras and the operator.

Aaron Christopher Rees

What inspired you to get started on this body of work?

My work has always loosly navigated what I would refer to as, the phenomological experience of seeing, or ‘Altered states of Vision,’ in the past this has navigated performance, drones, stereoscopic vision, cameras and the operator.

But for this next body or work I wanted to take a departure from utilizing comsumer/hitech and focus a bit on my origins, which is making darkroom prints, and playing more with allegory, abstraction and symbolism.

Do you work on distinct projects or do you take a broader approach to your practice?

My video installation work generally is based around a concept or idea, whilst in and around these projects I make photographic prints to compliment, or as an exercise in expressive thinking.

I find the act of physically making quite meditive, so I use that space to reflect upon the broader nature of my practice.

What’s a typical day like in your studio?

Unfortunatley at this present moment due to the pandemic, I am unable to use my studio. So I have taken this time to focus on research and visualing images.

I split my practice between studio, home office space and offsite darkroom. So there really is no typical studio day for me.

Generally home is video editing and digital work (clean), and the studio is making images, storage and testing lab (messy).

Who are your favorite artists?

Michael Snow as an allrounder, but I tend to find I think more about specific projects or exhibitions by artists.

Fiona Tan’s exhibition ‘Terminology,’ in particular the video piece, ‘Kingdom of shadows.”

The exhibition Lua Cão by Alexandre Estrela, João Maria Gusmão & Pedro Paiva

Escape Vehical no.6 by Simon Faithfull

Most recently I have been really taken by the prints of Tamar Halpern & Eileen Quinlan.

Currently influenced by the writing of theorist Anne Friedberg, and author W. G. Sebald.

Where do you go to discover new artists?

No where in particular, but If I visit a city/country I will try to visit the muesums, comercial and artist run spaces.

I spend a bit of time flicking through and borrowing books from the library of the university I work for.

I try to limit my time scolling through images of artists work on blogs and instagram, whilst a guilty pleasure it oftern just results in entering the screenhole and coming out with a sense of lack, it tends to make everything feel flatpacked in delivered in a vaccum…. but maybe that’s just the feeling of contemprenaity. (haha)

Aaron Christopher Rees is an artist based in Naarm, Melbourne, Australia who was recently shortlisted for The Hopper Prize. To learn more about the artist:

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