Grant Stevens

Grant Stevens


‘In an era defined by time deficits and information overloads, I am seeking possibilities for self-reflection and contemplation. It’s been a really interesting process to walk to these waterfalls – sometimes for minutes, sometimes for hours. Before I go, I search for images of these places online. When I get there, there are often other people taking photographs. We’re all on our own quests to take the same photograph.’
GRANT STEVENS

Responding to the cultural conditions of the ‘attention economy’, this series documents popular waterfalls in close proximity to Sydney. Composition, light, perspective and tonality unify these unique and disparate locations conforming them to modes of natural beauty. For the artist, they ‘waver between the fantastical and romanticised on the one hand, and the bleakly generic on the other.’ These ‘Instagram perfect’ photographs bear witness to the beauty of gravitational flow of water. As the outcome of the artist’s contemporary act of pilgrimage to each site, these images hold the promise of happiness and existential truths.

The Work

The Waterfalls series, 2016

The Waterfalls I, II, IV-VIII, & XI
Colour inks on paper
All images courtesy of the Artist and Sullivan & Strumpf, Sydney

About the Artist

Grant Stevens is based in Sydney and works predominantly with computer graphics, moving image, and photography. His practice explores the various ways that digital technologies and conventions of representation mediate our inner worlds and social realities. Stevens has exhibited widely in Australia, and held numerous solo exhibitions in New Zealand, Europe, and the United States. His work has also been curated into many group exhibitions at publicly funded museums and contemporary art spaces, including LA Louver and The Torrence Art Museum, Los Angeles, USA (2013 & 2011), Shenzhen, China (2010) and Ponte Contemporanea, Rome, Italy (2007). Stevens is currently Deputy Head of School (Art) at UNSW Art & Design. He is represented by Sullivan + Strumpf, Sydney, and Starkwhite, Auckland.

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