A HANDMADE LIFE 2
Chrissie Cotter Gallery, 2018
“Too Good to Use”
After developing early life survival strategies for the isolation and mediocrity of suburban life, Cook realised a lot of her formative knowledge came from domestic items.
The tea towel led the charge in her understanding of the world – from geography, biology, social attitudes, poetry, politics and an appreciation of foods and local cultures throughout Australia.
Later in life she returned to the tea towel as a medium for her artwork.
“Art you could use” she exclaimed! However, she was continually met with the refrain “Too good to use”
In this suite of work Cook takes a ‘tongue in cheek’ look at her Australiana tea towel collection
and revisits her 2007 work “States of the Art” to create her own unique and ever so slightly irreverent works.
