Holden with hair curlers

A sculptor and experimental filmmaker, Margaret Dodd is a leading contributor to the feminist art movement in Australia. Through her studies at the University of California, Davis, she became part of Funk Ceramics, a radical new movement led by her teacher Robert Arneson. Dodd was inspired by the movement’s encouragement to rebel against the formal conventions of good taste, using wit and humour, and in 1966 she participated in the first Funk Ceramics exhibition at West Museum in San Francisco. Her work was favourably highlighted by TIME Magazine and described as ‘a rococo ceramic line of miniature cars’. Returning to Australia in 1968, Dodd became a major figure in the development of experimental art in Adelaide.

This work relates to Dodd’s internationally acclaimed series of ceramic Holden sculptures (1977) and her avant-garde film (1982), which share the title This Woman is Not a Car. Employing funk, dada and surrealist methods of expression, Dodd blends reality with fantasy in a critique of the culture of masculinity and the role assigned to women in modern Australian society. Today, Dodd continues to employ the potent symbol of Australia’s iconic Holden car to explore notions of national identity, masculinity and femininity.

Elle Freak, Associate Curator of Australian Art