2020 Creative Generation Award

We are proud to say that this is the third year in a row that our amazingly talented students have been recognised and awarded the Creative Generation: Excellence in Visual Arts award. Congratulations to Year 12 Visual Art student Martha Bizimana who exhibited artwork in an online exhibition, as part of the Creative Generation Metropolitan Region Awards for Visual Arts. The Awards recognise excellence in Senior Visual Art education and student achievement throughout Queensland’s state and non-state schools. Martha’s work The gaze was selected from 521 submissions by a panel of judges for a Minister’s Excellence Award, and will be on display at the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) in 2021 in an exhibition of outstanding student work.

Water is life, our existence depends on it. In the Christian spiritual sense water is used to cleanse someone’s sins against god. Historically, women and people of colour have been the subject of art not the creator and been exploited by the male or colonial gaze. Similarly religious structure is traditionally male dominated. By staring at the camera I initiate an act of flipping the traditional relationship between the subject and the viewer in relation to art and religion. This intimate exchange of gazes where red ink moves across and engulfs the face is confronting and questions these traditional roles.

Numerous experiments with ink being dropped in water were filmed and edited. This final footage was projected on to the artists face in a pitch black room using a data projector and laptop. This process was filmed using a dslr camera and tripod. Video editing software Premiere Pro was used to edit the final video: including colour correction, darkening areas behind the figure, adding sound effects and trimming and resizing the footage/sound. The final work is presented as a projection at 2 x 1.5 metres.