2023 Grad Show

Jessica Tonn

AUArts Grad Show IMG_6996

Drawing

jessicatonnart.wixsite.com/portfolio

I manipulate perceived reality. With photography, animation, watercolour, and soundscape, I combine mystery with technology to summon eerie, ephemeral encounters between the viewer and my imagined world. My work explores melancholia stasis by combining shadow with ritual. This unspoken agreement creates a conversation of doubt, as if they have stumbled across something peculiar that they were not supposed to see, rewarding those who peer closer.

Uncover the strange shadows you see out of the corner of your eye, the fairies that play tricks on you, and the creatures you swear you see right before you blink.

Of The Bramble, We 20 x 13” Photograph, stop motion animation, mounted on foam core 2022 The faintly blurred photograph depicts a curious scene. A pocket clearing scattered with sun-bleached bones. Four glowing spirits prance among the grass. Fading in and out of the corporeal realm, they privately dance, writhing and twitching to warbled sounds of the almost-forest. Their deranged movements puppet strange glee and ritual. All is dim.
Of The Bramble, We
Of The Bramble, We Full view
Of The Bramble, We Side view
Of The Bramble, We Base photograph

Bonedancers

This animated photograph is my grad piece. I created it in my second last semester, and its unsettling and alluring presence encapsulates my practice.

Bonedancers AUArts Grad Show IMG_6467
Of The Bramble, We 20 x 13”
Photograph, stop motion animation, mounted on foam core
2022

The faintly blurred photograph depicts a curious scene. A pocket clearing scattered with sun-bleached bones. Four glowing spirits prance among the grass. Fading in and out of the corporeal realm, they privately dance, writhing and twitching to warbled sounds of the almost-forest. Their deranged movements puppet strange glee and ritual.
All is dim.
Bonedancers
Of The Bramble, We
Bonedancers AUArts Grad Show IMG_6453
Of The Bramble, We Full view
Bonedancers AUArts Grad Show IMG_6465
Of The Bramble, We Side view
Bonedancers AUArts Grad Show bonedancers_flattened
Of The Bramble, We Base photograph
Low Humming Undertone acrylic, watercolour, acrylic medium 46 x 30 x 1.5" 2023
The Moondance Children acrylic, watercolour, acrylic medium, conte, oil and chalk pastel 30 x 20 x 0.75" 2023
Ghost Face ink, chalk pastel, conte, watercolour on rag paper 17 x 30" x 2 2023
Wraith 1 Watercolour on photograph 20x13" 2023
Wraith 2 Watercolour on photograph 20x13" 2023
Wraith 1 and 2 Full view

Melancholia Wraiths

Melancholia is my base emotion. It is stasis. An inescapable being. Limbo fueled by self-reviling and cessation of interest in the outside world. It is a ritual of exchanging sanity so one can keep living. A purgatory. Sigmund Freud it described as, “being caught in an exorable and inescapable relation to the lost object, the ego of the melancholic is in a constant state of damage and disintegration.”
 
When you experience melancholia, you yourself become a spectre. A spectator of your own life. A wraith. Disconnected from anything that matters. All your senses are numbed except the ones swirling incoherently in unrecognizable language in your own mind.

Melancholia Wraiths AUArts Grad Show IMG_6961
Low Humming Undertone acrylic, watercolour, acrylic medium
46 x 30 x 1.5"
2023
Melancholia Wraiths AUArts Grad Show IMG_6735
The Moondance Children acrylic, watercolour, acrylic medium, conte, oil and chalk pastel
30 x 20 x 0.75"
2023
Melancholia Wraiths AUArts Grad Show IMG_6766
Ghost Face ink, chalk pastel, conte, watercolour on rag paper
17 x 30" x 2
2023
Melancholia Wraiths AUArts Grad Show IMG_6840
Wraith 1 Watercolour on photograph
20x13"
2023
Melancholia Wraiths AUArts Grad Show PenultimateFullSizeRender
Wraith 2 Watercolour on photograph
20x13"
2023
Melancholia Wraiths AUArts Grad Show IMG_7103
Wraith 1 and 2 Full view
Eyeworms Full room animated projection Soundscape, blanket and pillow 2023 The earthy animation spans the walls, floor and ceiling, inviting the viewer to lay on the blanket and silently stare upward; reminiscent of having insomnia and staring at the worms that wriggle behind your eyes. As others enter the room, they will see the pulsing worms crawling over the viewers as their shadows are cast onto the walls. Echoing birds create a strange yet warm space. A space underneath realities.
Eyeworms Right wall view
Eyeworms Video and audio recording
Crystalis Floor animated projection Crystals, trinkets, ferret skull, mirror, dried flowers, rocks 2023 Animated fairy lights throb across the still grass. In this clearing, a circle of rocks mark an abandoned hoard of treasure. The uncertain atmosphere both repels and lures the viewer into the circle to examine each trinket. As they walk, they step on dried flowers, crackling and releasing their musty, sweet aroma. The warped grass reflects up the walls in silent, liminal tranquility.
Crystalis
Crystalis Video and audio recording

Past the Threshold

Engaging multiple senses at the same time is essential to create an all-encompassing experience, not just a moment on the wall.

Our minds produce reality and thoughts that only we perceive in our unique and individual eyes. Since make belief memories are stored in the same part of the brain as real ones, it makes them just as real.

I explore how making artwork the threshold can summon an otherworldly reality into this one. I combine mystery with technology to create eerie, ephemeral encounters using interactivity and engaging multiple senses at once.

Past the Threshold AUArts Grad Show IMG_6999 (1) 2
Eyeworms Full room animated projection
Soundscape, blanket and pillow
2023

The earthy animation spans the walls, floor and ceiling, inviting the viewer to lay on the blanket and silently stare upward; reminiscent of having insomnia and staring at the worms that wriggle behind your eyes. As others enter the room, they will see the pulsing worms crawling over the viewers as their shadows are cast onto the walls. Echoing birds create a strange yet warm space. A space underneath realities.
Past the Threshold AUArts Grad Show IMG_6976
Eyeworms Right wall view
Past the Threshold
Eyeworms Video and audio recording
Past the Threshold AUArts Grad Show _MG_1602
Crystalis Floor animated projection
Crystals, trinkets, ferret skull, mirror, dried flowers, rocks
2023

Animated fairy lights throb across the still grass. In this clearing, a circle of rocks mark an abandoned hoard of treasure. The uncertain atmosphere both repels and lures the viewer into the circle to examine each trinket. As they walk, they step on dried flowers, crackling and releasing their musty, sweet aroma. The warped grass reflects up the walls in silent, liminal tranquility.
Past the Threshold AUArts Grad Show _MG_1535
Crystalis
Past the Threshold
Crystalis Video and audio recording
Before You Blink Rags, boxes, staples, paper mache, ambience 78 x 29 x 31” 2022 Illuminated by a single source of light, the creature stands still, observing and communicating in the echoing dream space. Shrouded in rags, it clicks and groans. Faceless, the grandmother raven is immersed in dim ambience and foreboding thunder, crawling out of the murky darkness. Link to video/audio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWkBUBD6IzM&feature=youtu.be
The Disappearance of Emma Longely Digitally altered photographs mounted on foam core 13 x 20” x 2 2022 A series of photographs that meld the realms of reality and the imagined, revealing a narrative progressing between the frames. Dramatic, dynamic, and seeking angles pan over the remnants of dim-lit corridors and crumbling foundation. The building’s lingering character intertwines with subtle alterations and hidden figures, revealing a place without a place.
They Hide Behind the Trees Book, dirt, ink, graphite, acrylic 11 x 9 x 1.5” A tattered book was discovered in the woods not far from here. It is a relic from the post-apocalyptic future, and in it is the instructional scrawling of a bitter survivor with a sarcastic disposition. It was contained in [REDACTED] until recently when a museum claimed the rights to the book, as it was discovered on their property. Since then, many scholars and scientists have studied the book attempting to decipher what wonders it holds.

Rifts Into The Otherworld

My work is a celebration of the unknown. Parafiction. The things we wish were real, and what might be real. What could be real even for a moment. The unseen. Phenomena. Sonder. The incomprehensible wonder of the world and the possibility of others beyond the veil. The viewer is invited to partake in the evocation on their own terms.
Artifice versus reality. Doubt. My work creates an uncanny unease by revealing ephemeral materials that change as they are observed.

Rifts Into The Otherworld AUArts Grad Show IMG_6594
Before You Blink Rags, boxes, staples, paper mache, ambience
78 x 29 x 31”
2022

Illuminated by a single source of light, the creature stands still, observing and communicating in the echoing dream space. Shrouded in rags, it clicks and groans. Faceless, the grandmother raven is immersed in dim ambience and foreboding thunder, crawling out of the murky darkness.

Link to video/audio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWkBUBD6IzM&feature=youtu.be
Rifts Into The Otherworld AUArts Grad Show IMG_6666
The Disappearance of Emma Longely Digitally altered photographs mounted on foam core
13 x 20” x 2
2022

A series of photographs that meld the realms of reality and the imagined, revealing a narrative progressing between the frames. Dramatic, dynamic, and seeking angles pan over the remnants of dim-lit corridors and crumbling foundation. The building’s lingering character intertwines with subtle alterations and hidden figures, revealing a place without a place.
Rifts Into The Otherworld AUArts Grad Show IMG_6583 2
They Hide Behind the Trees Book, dirt, ink, graphite, acrylic
11 x 9 x 1.5”
A tattered book was discovered in the woods not far from here. It is a relic from the post-apocalyptic future, and in it is the instructional scrawling of a bitter survivor with a sarcastic disposition. It was contained in [REDACTED] until recently when a museum claimed the rights to the book, as it was discovered on their property. Since then, many scholars and scientists have studied the book attempting to decipher what wonders it holds.

This site may contain artworks with provocative content that some viewers may find uncomfortable or upsetting. AUArts supports a culture of non-censorship and ongoing conversations about contemporary art.