Patrick Pound

To create The Point of Everything, 2018, for Divided Worlds, Patrick Pound firstly trawled through the Art Gallery of South Australia’s online collection, then through the physical stores themselves, looking closely at the works of art, at insignificant details, and searching for ‘like’ images and things. In a diverse range of portraits and figure paintings, Pound found commonality in the simple gesture of ‘pointing’. Stretching the concept (or he would say ‘point’) further, Pound noticed objects with pointed parts such as C.E. Firnhaber’s, Presentation trowel, c.1850, and Rowan Pootchemunka’s carved wooden Echidna, 1996–97, and even discovered a photograph of a power point! As these examples reveal, Pound’s love of wordplay and the nuances of language are as much a part of his work as the images.

Pound refers to his collection categories as ‘Galleries’ or ‘Museums’, a humorous conceit which plays on notions
 of the authority and significance ascribed to objects in institutional archives. In the case of The Point of Everything, the objects, all of which ‘hold an idea of the point and pointing’, make up a fictitious ‘Museum of pointing’.

JULIE ROBINSON

Listen to Julie Robinson, Senior Curator of Prints, Drawings & Photographs, discuss Patrick Pound’s work in the 2018 Adelaide Biennial HERE