title. An Enduring Symbol
date. 2000
Location. Perth Institute of Contemporary Art
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Harry Hummerston has long chosen to work with traditional images, after all they have a better track record.
His one-person show at PICA is mostly dedicated to the skull and just a little to the rose.
In a cut-price version of Warhol's instant art there is whole wall of small take-home Hummerston collage skull prints, quite brilliant and on sale at $10 each - just put your money in the honesty box and help yourself.
Warhol himself made a group of skull prints late in his career as he too felt the lifeblood of day-to-day
imagery slowly seeping away. I doubt though that simply because the skull is an ancient symbol of death it is capable of resisting the general collapse of all images into corporate digital mush.
Hummerston himself has morphed the rose and
the skull - a transgression that must lead to the dissolution of all images into one.
​
David Bromfield
On Show
