VIEWING ROOM

JEDDA-DAISY CULLEY
‘DOWNLOAD HATS’

Jerico Contemporary is pleased to present our fifth solo exhibition with Australian artist Jedda-Daisy Culley, ‘Download Hats’. The exhibition opened on Friday 1st of July and continues until Saturday 23rd of July 2022. 

'Download Hats' is a dramatic expression in psychoactive portraiture exploring the metaphysical nature of the almighty mother as a monster-like ghost exploding outside her physical form. These portraits seek to make seen the spirited often see-through aspects of a woman’s power with rapid witch like intuition. Alongside these brave cuddling forms are on-lookers, often referred to as ‘him’ or ‘cowboy’, they’re frozen with fear, haunted with ingenuine protection and fake smiles.

Faces that plague her mind, smiling demons she thinks, creepily disillusioned with empty promises, a limp hand frightens her. She sees them in floods of misguided and conflicting information raining down their faces, hodgepodging their clarity and identity in a veil of data. They’re lined up watching her, torn apart, she’s exposing herself under their gaze. Trust is the ultimate obscurer. ‘Download Hats’ contributes to a conversation deconstructing the fails of disillusioned masculine authority and rewrites the mother archetype with bold intimacy. 

‘He thinks my special brush is an upside-down dolly head, a Rapunzel barbie, with extra-long-spiritual-guru-hair, the kind that can pull men up the side of castle towers — that’s exactly how I make these works. I need the extra length to see through you. I have spare download hats for hiding your robot eyes when it rains gooey ooey confusing shit. I can catch a big fish, claw the eyes from a devil; go with me into the apocalypse, your little blanket won’t help, it's hot like fire and we be busy, said the bikini to the sarong. YouTube guru girl got a UTI on the retrograde coz she’s being tested. It's shady business, your past, but we not raising Tamagotchi’s anymore, we real-life-girl-club online, inter-ninth dimensional uprising. I’m downloading a hypnotherapy session to upgrade my ESP, if you feel something that was me practicing my voodoo. PTSD is vermin, my brain is dragging along the gravel, grinding, and shredding connections; have you ever thought about the songs you might sing when your faith supply is drained? I used to think my feminism was gentle, domestic based; the curtain blows in the breeze, stitching kind. But now I have extra expressive senses to capture the beastliness of her soul dancing with a long bamboo stick.’

– JEDDA-DAISY CULLEY

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY:

Jedda-Daisy Culley was born in 1984, Perth, Western Australia. The artist holds an Master of Fine Arts (UNSW) and a Bachelor of Fine Arts, with First Class Honours (UNSW). Her solo exhibitions include, ‘And your mother’s psychic spaghetti river’, Jerico Contemporary, Sydney (2021), 'Pls send pics this feels one~sided', Cement Fondu Project Space, Sydney (2021), ‘WIMON’, Jerico Contemporary (2020), ‘FEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELINGS’, Jerico Contemporary, Sydney (2020), ‘Printers and Portals’, Jerico Contemporary, Sydney (2019), 'Burn at the Lands Brim', Mild Manners Gallery, Sydney (2018), 'Universal Love', Mild Manners Gallery, Sydney (2016), ‘Bits of Pink’, Sheffer Gallery, Sydney (2010), ‘Peace and Universe’, Chalk Horse, Sydney (2009) and ‘Footsies and Dirty Drunkards’ Chalk Horse, Sydney (2008). Her group exhibitions include, ‘Telepathic Pikelet’, Woollahra Gallery, Sydney (2022), 'String Theory', Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (2013), ‘k.O.M.A Project’, Mild Manners Gallery, Sydney (2013), ‘Hands On’, Hazlehurst Regional Gallery, Sydney (2011), ‘Chalk Reindeer’, Chalk Horse, Sydney (2010) and ‘String Theory’ Chalk Horse, Sydney (2007). Her recent prizes include, finalist in the Grace Cossington Smith Art Award, Sydney (2021), finalist in the Fisher's Ghost Art Award, Sydney (2021) and The 66th Blake Prize, Sydney (2021). The artist currently lives and works in Sydney, Australia