Tai Snaith + Matilda Davis, 2024. Courtesy the artists.

Time of the Signs

Tai Snaith, Matilda Davis

3–27 Jul 2024

Time of the Signs sees mid-career Melbourne artists Tai Snaith and Matilda Davis come together to create a veritable visual compost of the layers of one’s psyche in symbols - melting them down with metabolic ingenuity in a big pot of brand loyalty well past its use-by date. Both artists working in parallel with clay, found objects and oil painting to create a dense and visually arresting collection of new work celebrating the intersection of Semiotics, Surrealism and Illustration.

Davis and Snaith present a dense and visually arresting collection of new work celebrating the intersection of Semiotics, Surrealism and Illustration. Symbols and signs come together through two artists’ hands to create a grand, strange narrative.

Taking their cues from nature, culture and science; the ‘wood wide web‘, astrophysics, psychoanalysis and a long history of other artists and scientists’ valiant attempts at dissolving the structures of the self. With visual references that range from nature’s timeless icons such as seashells and expressions of Fibonacci spirals to old English and pagan cultural references like the The Green Man and iron keys and more recent symbols of western mythologies like the Loch Ness monster and the wicked stepmother.

These two established mid-career Melbourne artists create a veritable visual compost of the layers of one’s psyche in symbols - melting them down with metabolic ingenuity in a big pot of brand loyalty well past its use-by date. The end result sees both artists working with clay, found objects and oil painting to create a satisfying series of visual riddles, guaranteed to leave audiences questioning signs and symbols in every aspect of their lives - agreeing that beauty is indeed one step away from entropy.

Time of the Signs, Matilda Davis & Tai Snaith, BLINDSIDE Gallery, 2024. Exhibition Install. Photograph by Astrid Mulder. Courtesy the artists.

Matilda Davis, For Emily Dickinson and Fiona Apple, 2021. Oil on linen on pine board, silk trim, freshwater pearls, 30 x 40cm. Courtesy the artist and Futures Gallery.

Matilda Davis, Self Portrait, 2022. Oil on linen on pine board, cotton pleated trim, 30 x 40cm. Courtesy the artist and Futures Gallery.

Tai Snaith, Loch and Key, 2022. Midfire ceramic, pigment. 30 x 18cm. Photograph Matthew Stanton. Courtesy the artist.

Tai Snaith, Samos poem of stones and signs, 2023. Porcelain, pebbles, fragments of tile, 11 x 31 x 7cm. Photograph Matthew Stanton. Courtesy the artist.

Tai Snaith, The Kite Museum (detail), 2024. Oil on canvas, 55 x 45cm. Courtesy the artist.

Onsite, Exhibition

Key Dates

Opening : 3 Jul 2024, 8am–10am

Artist Talk with Matilda Davis & Tai Snaith: 27 Jul 2024, 4am–6am

Acknowledgment

This program takes place on the land of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. We recognise that sovereignty was never ceded - this land is stolen land. We pay respects to Wurundjeri Elders, past, present and emerging, to the Elders from other communities and to any other Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islanders who might encounter or participate in the program.

Biographies

Tai Snaith investigates the nature of visual storytelling, nostalgic viewpoints and personal histories. She works across a broad range of mediums including painting, sculpture, spoken conversations and large public realm commissions. Her current body of oil paintings were begun during her residency at Bundanon in 2023 and continued into 2024 where she has been working in a whole derelict house in North Fitzroy as her studio. Tai will be presenting a solo exhibition of paintings with Nicholas Thompson Gallery in August 2024.

Tai (born Melbourne 1980) graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Visual Arts) from the Victorian College of Art in 2002. Tai has work held in numerous public and private collections, including Artbank, NGA, Bayside, Great Victorian Rail Trail and the State Library of Victoria. Tai has written and illustrated 6 picture books published with Thames and Hudson Australia, shortlisted for the world Illustration Awards in London and the winner of the Banyule works on paper prize.

Matilda Davis creates oil paintings imbued with peculiar characters, latent narratives and cosmological reckonings. Observations of science, art history, nature and objects create molten imagery that forms psychological landscapes in episodic sections. Her focus is both micro and macro. Mise en scenes are painstakingly rendered and placed in fantastical landscapes that pulse with connection to the universe and the self.

Matilda (born Sydney, 1996) graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Visual Arts) from the Victorian College of Art in 2017. Select solo exhibitions include Melbourne Art Fair, 2024; Romantic Geometry: Exploring the emotional spiral, FUTURES, Melbourne, 2022; I’ve got something to show you, Neon Parc, 2019. Select group exhibitions include The Bad Gardener, FUTURES, Melbourne, 2023; As Real as it Gets, SEVENTH Gallery, Melbourne 2022; 4am Flaming Arrows, Bundoora Homestead, Curated by Jemi Gale, Melbourne 2022; Carny, Neon Parc, Brunswick, 2019.

Matilda is represented by Futures Gallery, Melbourne.