Australian artist, Jodi Woodward’s site-specific installation in the Community gallery consists of four related elements: a larger than life-sized self-portrait of the artist in recovery, an artist’s book, meticulously hand-drawn crossed hatching directly on the walls and a quote by the poet and play write Samuel Beckett. The artist asks viewers to reflect on how they (we) choose to spend the time we are given in our lives. She repeatedly asks: “Do we just tick over the days or do we actively reflect on what we do and why we do it? Do we just repeat the same behaviors over and over or do we choose to change what we do, or behave differently? I’m very interested in behavior, psychology, memory, and trauma and how that impacts our behavior.”
Jodi Woodward; Self Portrait; Archival inkjet print
Installation by Jodi Woodward; Archival inkjet print, black chalk.
Installation detail by Jodi Woodward; Archival inkjet print, black chalk
Artist statement
1, 2, 3, 4, 5……. is an investigation into how we choose to live our lives and occupy our time. The exhibitions raises questions about how memory influences behavior and how our current behaviors continue to serve us. Do we actively participate and reflect on our lives, or do we just tick the days over, one after the other, repeating the same patterns of behavior again and again?
“…….I shall go on doing as I have always done, not knowing what it is I do, nor who I am, nor where I am, nor if I am.” (Samuel Beckett)
– Jodi Woodward
About the artist
Jodi Woodward, a portrait of the artist with her installation.
Jodi Woodward is a multimedia visual artist based in Australia who is working in expanded drawing, photography and installation. Woodward’s work explores the complexities of human behavior, the human condition, identity and memory. Through a process driven auto-ethnographic framework, Woodward aims to investigate her relationship with the materials she uses to examine the processes of repetition and endurance.
Woodward has a BFA from Queensland College of Art, Griffith University; a BVA from Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW; and a Bachelor of Education (Adult Education) from the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia. In 2017 she received the Ignition Prize from the National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA) in Australia.