Here and Now: Gold Coast Triennial 2024 Digital Gallery
Savannah Jarvis
b.1998 Brisbane QLD, lives Brisbane QLD
The oyster says to the pearl, 2023
pearl, acrylic pearl, polycotton, cotton wadding
Image courtesy of the artist. Photographer: Louis Lim
Artist Statement
The oyster says to the pearl draws from a historical art tradition of 'female body as object’. Borrowing the satirical tropes, it redirects focus to bodies with chronic pain, showing the overwhelm of endometriosis pain, exaggerating its bodily manifestation. The oyster too understands what it is to grow strange. A stomach is not organs, it is a crucible in which mother of pearl coats the walls. The oyster makes beautiful these irritants, in hopes of one day excavating these growths.
About the Artist
Savannah Jarvis is an emerging Meanjin/Brisbane artist whose multidisciplinary practice investigates linguistic expressions of pain and historical difficulties in communicating pain.
Investigating the popular hypothesis of pain as a 'private object', her work explores the philosophical framework that 'private objects' cannot be expressed with language, believing that within the trope of 'pain's inexpressible nature,' a problem arises, with regards to healthcare providers and the historic undertreatment of women.
Savannah believes that pain has an articulation, and her work explores the avenues within which we may find it, underpinned by the belief that images may succeed in the realms in which language has failed. Savannah incorporates historical pastiche art, and discursive visuals to explore how we may begin to understand and articulate the complex relationship between pain, the medical body and language.
In 2020, Savannah completed a BFA with Honours at the Queensland College of Art.
