Artist: Bennett Miller
Work: Ed Devereaux and The Kellerberrin Klobbers (2006)
Location: Kellerberrin, Western Australia
Ed Devereaux by Bennett Miller is made up of a miniature speedway track with remote control utes, an amusement parlor for the locals and the establishment of ‘The Kellerberrin Klobbers’, a fictitious football team.
Suitably impressed at how sports captures the heart and soul of a small rural community, Miller transformed the IASKA gallery into an interactive miniature sporting ground, recreating the much loved and diverse local sporting venues.
Ed Devereaux consisted of a circular speedway track for remote control utes, surrounded by a series of smaller games that served as an amusement parlour for the locals. The games structure playfully alluded to serious issues facing a wheatbelt community, such as the dwindling and ageing populations, "wheat-for-oil" and salination.
The Kellerberrin Klobbers is a work created with the participation of local youth. It boasts designer logos, jerseys, personalised football cards, team interviews and panel reviews, yet has never played an actual game. The team is marketed, analyzed and "produced" in spite of this fact, in an effort to replicate the mass marketing of the AFL. The Kellerberrin Klobbers celebrates the value of sport, humour and creativity for young people as distinct from the saturated market of "stars" that they are encouraged to emulate.
Bennett states: "I am interested in the effect isolation can have on an individual and/or community, and the various measures employed to combat this. Out here in Kellerberin, alcohol, sport and cars strike me as the frontline in the battle with boredom."
About the artist:
Bennett is an emerging sculptural and installation artist from Perth , Western Australia . As an artist, Bennett is drawn to the use of sporting codes in an effort to activate the competitive ego of the audience. Through his artwork he pulls in a crowd with the promise of "cheap thrills and mock glory", quietly and subvertly allowing them consider greater topical and serious issues. This is best seen through the series entitled 'the golf war', a mini-golf course that mimics the story of the current war in Iraq .
He has exhibited nationally at galleries including the Meat Market, Melbourne; Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne; Bus Gallery, Melbourne; Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, Perth; and the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts.
