Trail by Surprise

Trail by Surprise
This series was commissioned by the Powerhouse Museum to coincide with the 2009 Sydney Design Festival. I had been awarded a traveling scholarship as part of the festival the previous year and this series of 4m floor-to-ceiling banners marked one of the first major projects I had undertook upon my return. In the cafe, I designed new place-mats, menus and crockery that visitors used throughout the event. The museum opened up its collection to me and I curate a display case based on my own curiosities, mostly comprising of netsuke and charms. For this display, I created custom illustrations as backdrops for each exhibit and a continuous 5 metre calligraphic ink rice paper drawing for them all to be displayed against.

I was also invited present a speech about my work in comics and illustration and organised a collaborative comic making event with local illustrators and creatives for the festival. I can see much of my hunger to start playing with many of the ideas and influences I had accumulated on my professional development trip in this series. After constantly shifting from place to place, it seems to show how curious and eager I was to indulge in the luxury of pouring over a drawing table with big mess and marks!