The Cicely & Colin Rigg Contemporary Design Award
Karen Ferguson

"What began as an aesthetic choice has evolved until the remaking of ‘rubbish’ into items of value has become as much a subject as the other ideas my work explores. The materials that commonly interest me are devalued, such as old clothes and household detritus. While reworking the material’s substance, I rework its prior meaning too... You can’t reclaim the past, but you can reclaim its detritus. In a sense, that impossible task is what I am always seeking to do – reclaim, re-animate, re-live all that stuff that time leaves in its wake."

Karen FERGUSON
born Australia 1968
Floral Tributes (detail) (2002)
recycled clothing, wire, ceramic
two of 125.0 x 75.0 x 55.0 cm