Melbourne Art Fair: Kendal Murray, Vivid Dreams, Evergreen

The exhibition ‘Vivid Dreams, Evergreen’ is inspired by the space between dream and memory, play and identity, and stories of creative imaginings inspired by places in the natural world that hold onto your heart and become intrinsic to your sense of well-being.

They are the places that awakened our senses to the pleasures of nature and promised adventure,  with trees that reached into the sky and beckoned us to climb. In these places, we could jump into enormous piles of coloured leaves or the deepest of puddles, play hide-and-seek in lush textured ferns and build cubby houses with sticks and stones. Places where we could collect specimens, discover insects, investigate their intriguing habitats and let our imagination flow.

Complex natural environments full of mystery appealed to us as play spaces as they offered opportunities for discovery through exploration. Experiences of freedom and creativity through play afforded us the agency to be resourceful and develop connective and interactive relationships with the natural world. We could play with friends, explore, hide, imagine, and transform the environment to suit our games. While we played, we acquired knowledge of ecosystems and created powerful childhood memories of positive experiences in natural environments.

The sculptural artworks in the exhibition use child-sized tea set pieces assembled to mimic landscape forms for tiny people, animals, and birds. Edges of saucers act as roads or paths, and cups that hold vegetation, rocks, water pools, or forms that stand in for hills. Coin purses and mirrored compacts have been transformed into miniature reminders of family holidays and adventure, where discovery meets familiarity and ends in happiness. This transformative activity based on play, is a process of putting together ideas, feelings and expressions. The forms explore the concept that play in a natural environment encourages a relationship with place through knowledge and experience. It informs a sense of selfhood by being able to make choices and bring ideas into being that connect identity to nature and culture through imagination.

Sharing positive environmental experiences with important people and memories of pleasurable and fascinating interactions with nature shaped our environmental identity and had a lasting impact. These experiences can influence how we understand and value the environment into adulthood, prompting us to reflect on and appreciate the formative role of childhood play in natural landscapes. The sculptural assemblages represent childhood imaginings inspired by sensory wonder and delight, held in time capsules that ensure their care as environmental identity. Where positive and responsible relationships with the natural environment will ensure its protection and guarantee children natural places to play and experience their own wonder and delight.

Murray has had numerous solo and group exhibitions nationally and her work is held in public and private collections in Japan, Hong Kong, New Zealand, the UK, New York and Australia, including the Powerhouse Museum, Goulburn Regional Gallery, Coffs Harbour Regional Gallery, University of Western Sydney, University of New South Wales and the Commonwealth Bank Collection. She has been the recipient of several awards including the Deakin Small Sculpture Prize (2015) and the Beowulf Award in the Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize (2015). Her work has also been selected as finalist multiple times in the Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize (2023, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2010, 2004, 2001). She holds an MA (Hons) in Visual Art.