Polly Hollyoak

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Polly Hollyoak is an artist based in Victoria, she has successfully completed both a Bachelor of Fine Arts majoring in painting and a Masters of Fine Arts, graduating with distinction in both degrees. Polly’s work has been shown in both solo and group exhibitions locally, across Australia and internationally and has made the finals of prizes such as the Ravenswood Australians Women’s Art Prize

Artist Statement

Polly’s paintings present a dialogue between pop and abstraction. Straddling these boundaries her work explores colour, pattern and layering through the medium of painting. Borrowing freely from media imagery in our consumer culture it explores notions of consumption and desire by highlighting the volume and cacophony of imagery to which we are incessantly exposed. Through cropping, juxtaposition and layering images are transformed, and the distinction between what is real and what is representational dissolves away.

Polly’s latest series ‘All that Glitters’ incorporates the use of words.

“All That Glitters tells the story of us – me, my son, our struggles and where we are now … I will never forget the moment that his heart stopped and mine kept beating….

While this body of work may appear as a random collection of forms, it is in fact a narrative. It tells they story of love, loneliness, addiction, help received, help not received and the over prescribing of medication. It tells the story of yesterday, today and sadly tomorrow. For years we sought to mask, disguise and pretend – not with the intent of hiding our truth but to protect – Ed to protect us, we to protect him. This body of work represents that life – the clash of the internal and the external, the face we put on and that which lies beneath, the real and the façade.

On the surface the aesthetic appears as a celebration – full of colour, sparkle, glitter and life. However, a closer look will reveal the truth with an aesthetic completely out of sync with the content – an aphorism that represents the reality of my life – the memories, the moments, the overwhelming feelings that never come at once but together …. and the eternal and ever-present question of why?” – Polly Hollyoak

Artist CV

Selected Solo Exhibitions
2021 All that Glitter, Alternating Current Art Space, Windsor, Melbourne
2019 Ung Drill, Five Walls. Footscray, Melbourne
2019 Cacophony, Montsalvat Long Gallery, Eltham, Melbourne
2018 Wanderlust, Alternating Current Art Space, Windsor, Melbourne
2017 Superfluous, The Artrium Bayside, Sandringham, Melbourne
2017Pucker Up, Town Hall Gallery, City of Yarra, Richmond, Melbourne
2016 Flocked Up, Black Cat Gallery, Hawthorn, Melbourne
2016 Recent Works, Alternating Current Art Space, Windsor, Melbourne
2015 Colour and Cacophony, Off The Kerb, Collingwood, Melbourne
2013 Form on Form 2, Off The Kerb, Collingwood, Melbourne
2013 Form on Form: Simulacrum at Play, Trocadero, Footscray, Melbourne
2011 Cook, Clean, Consume, First Site Gallery, Melbourne

Collaborations
2019 Made to Measure, Town Hall Gallery Community Project, Hawthorn
2013 Interchange: We’re Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue, Seventh Gallery, Fitzroy, Melbourne

Selected Group Exhibitions
2021 Oprah has an Arts Degree, Black Cat Gallery, Collingwood, Melbourne
2020 Of Colour and Light – Women Abstract Artists Biennial, West End Art Space, Melbourne
2020 Lights Camera Fashion, Incub8, Collingwood, Melbourne
2019 Scavenged, Black Cat Gallery, Collingwood, Melbourne
2018 2018 Women’s Art Now, Yangpyeong Art Museum, South Korea
2018 Colour Me Once, Brunswick Street Gallery, Fitzroy, Melbourne
2017 Ravenswood Australians Women’s Art Prize, Gordon, Sydney
2017 Another World, Red Gallery, Fitzroy, Melbourne
2016 Art In My Mouth 3, Moosey Art, Norwich, UK
2016 Chalk and Cheese, Alternating Current Art Space, Windsor, Melbourne
2016 Pattern, Signal Point Gallery, Goolwa, South Australia
2016 Gelato, Traffic Jam Galleries, Neutral Bay, Sydney
2015 Colour in Action, Kapitan Keling Mosque, Georgetown, Penang
2015 Exploration 15’, Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne
2015 For the Love of Colour, Gallerysmith Project Space, North Melbourne

Public Art & Commissions
2021 ‘EncryptED’ Artbox Art Club, Australia
2016 Abundance, Knox Private Hospital, Immerse 2016
2016 ‘The Basement’, Hawthorn Arts Centre, a 36 metre mural at the rear of the Town Hall
2007 For the Love of Colour, The University Club, University of Western Australia

Academic Summary
2014 Master of Fine Arts, RMIT University, Melbourne
2011 Bachelor of Fine Arts (Painting), RMIT University, Melbourne
1992 Trade Certificate in Signwriting, Victoria University (formerly Melbourne College of Decoration)

Untitled. 2022

Kurt Herrmann

Untitled. is an annual tjg initiative that focuses on celebrating the works of guest artists foreign to our gallery space. Curated from local, interstate and international artists all at varying stages of their artistic journeys.

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Polly Hollyoak

Wacky

Funny

Trauma

Regret

Fight

Dead Inside

Anxiety

Artist Statement

Artist CV

Untitled. 2022

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