‘Untitled’ 1989 – Gordon Bennett
‘Untitled’ , by Gordon Bennett,is an artwork challenging traditional positive western idea’s of the discovery of Australia. Gordon bennett is an indigenous Australian artist, who comments on political and social problems through his art making.Bennett, grew up not knowing about his indigenous heritage, but slowly discovered the story of how Australia was founded,that they told at school wasn’t the truth,and when he became an artist he started to comment on it through his art.The artwork ‘Untitled’ was painted in 1989,a time declared of widespread sadness for the aborigines as it was 1 year after the bicentenary.
The impact of a discovery can be far-reaching and transformative for the individual and for broader society. Bennett’s cultural discovery of the way Australia was discovered was first through false representations in history books,but he slowly uncovered the truth of the treatment of the indigenous people and of this land,impacted himself. Now he’s created art that further impacts a broader society making comments of the truth.Bennett is somewhat rewriting history through his art.‘Untitled’ is a Grid with 6 square with a selection of 6 images associated with the familiar story of the ‘discovery’ of Botany Bay by Captain Cook in 1779 and scenes that show tension and violence that often characterises the relationship between the colonised and colonisers. Bennett couples each image with a single word.Bennett incorporates text to give new meaning.Written in capitals,that boldly asserts a new meaning for many Australian generations.An example of this is the first image of captain cook arriving at Botany Bay,has the word DISMAY placed under it,by using this word it focuses attention on the disposition of aboriginal people rather than the discovery of Australia which we associate it with.The 3rd frame shows a picture representing the murders of the indigenous,The word DISPERSE is placed under,because it was used by the colonisers to describe the killing of aboriginal people.
Bennetts use of word association effectively changes the traditional meaning associated with the image.‘Dis’ as a modern form of word means to disrespect so if the phonetic sound ‘Dis’ is repeated over and over ,this pattern becomes a beat to which one could call a rhythmic soundscape.By using language Bennett successfully explores the harsh truth behind the discovery of Australia.
In the artwork ‘Untitled’ Bennett explores that some discoveries may be questioned or challenged when viewed from different perspectives and their worth may be reassessed over time. The composer, Gordon Bennett, has used six squares as the dominant feature of his work, combined with colour, fading and positioning to represent a contradictory perspective on the settlement of Australia.The 6 squares fade from complete white to the final square Black, The bottom panel in the sequence of six images in ‘Untitled’ is a black square.This S\square Bennett chose it to be seen as a resilient black presence asserting itself in the settlement narrative that Bennett deconstructs. This reinforces the idea that discoveries can be assessed for their worth over time,because at one time this was seen as a great discovery,and from Bennett’s self discovery,his perspective is shown through the artwork,helping the viewer to rethink their notions.
A major link between The Motorcycle Diaries and ‘Untitled’ is the personal discovery at the heart of both; the social and political context that has had such a profound impact on the individual and a wider community and changed cultural norms.Che’s discovery impacts on him as an individual which acts as a catalyst for his discovery to impact a wider community as he becomes a revolutionary.Similarly Bennetts self discovery as an indigenous man,impacts the wider community as he shows them his discovery through his art.Discovery can be shown through many different texts.What I find interesting is how vastly different these two text types are,these are represented for many different purposes.
Discovery 