I got chatting to someone out at Walker Ceramics in Fyshwick yesterday, who was telling me about an installation that took place in the CSIRO Discovery Centre late last year. Ken Yonetani, a post graduate student working in ceramics at the Canberra School of Art, made 2000 tiles, each 30cm square and only about 5mm thick, fired in the Japanese ‘fumie’ style tradition. The tiles took about 6 months to make, and were white and fragile, with an image of one of 6 different endangered butterflies cast in relief on each one. They were then laid wall-to-wall on the floor in various spaces in the Discovery Centre, and the people who had gathered for the launch were invited in… Within a short time the tiles were broken into tiny pieces. Jeff Doyle’s article in the Journal of Australian Ceramics, ‘Ken Yonetani’s installation at CSIRO Discovery, ACT’ gives pictures and details of the installation, including the reactions as people realised the implicit metaphor involved in the destruction. Cool stuff!
I still like the butterfly alphabet posters that have each letter illustrated by close-up markings on butterfly wings. Apparently they took 24 years to source.
