Fairy Land

David Helmers, n.d. Image: Peter Bonifacio and Geoff Bartlett.

David Helmers

Gallery 2

Friday 9 August - Sunday 1 September 2024

Opening Thursday 8 August 2024, 6pm - 8pm

How do you play? Helmers draws on ideas of a beginners mind where his experimental practice involves playing with materials in an effort to look to their voice and express their vitality. The results of this pursuit are on display in Fairy Land - in objects that ask to look beyond fetish and explore queer ideas on Thing power. It is the artist’s hope that in expressing material agency and in encouraging a state of play has potential to impact social and environmental change - where we are open to renegotiate rules, roles, boundaries; to expose cultural restraints and what we know of ourselves and others - both human and non-human.

As a survivor of sexual assault that resulted in a HIV diagnosis and the challenge of facing the associated stigma, Helmers draws on his lived experience of play in seeking out moments of joy that he comments “Enables me to negotiate life better.”

About the Artist

David Helmers, n.d. Image: Peter Bonifacio and Geoff Bartlett.

David Helmers found inspiration in Japan in reflecting on how an accumulation of small moments of joy, drinking tea from an ash fired vessel, could contribute to wellbeing and social change. This led to his Masters that explored the concept of Enchanted Vulnerability – simply - how joy can facilitate a beginners mind where rules are in a state of play. A concept he translates poetically in the translucent walls of his porcelain sculptures that gayfully populate his installations. Demand’s of our modern life restrict time to reflect, Helmers hopes viewers respond to the vitality of his work in drawing them near to create space that allow the viewer to find their voice in the experience of his work. 

David has exhibited in solo shows in both Melbourne and Sydney post his Masters and in group shows including the Tom Bass sculpture prize in 2020. In 2017 he was also a finalist in the Deakin University small sculpture prize, he has won the Wangaratta Sculpture Biennale and has his work in the Chang Chun Sculpture Museum.