Elizabeth Stewart Faul, Aunt Vera moved to the Yukon, 2026. Image courtesy of Andrew Sikorski
Elizabeth Stewart Faul
CHUTESPACE
Opening Thusday 19 February, 2026, 6-8pm
Friday 20 February - Sunday 15 March
In 1950 Elizabeth Faul’s mother, Barbara Stewart, came to Canberra from her home in California, on a posting to the US embassy. She brought a large collection of family photographs of brother, parents, multiple aunts and friends who she stayed in contact with through her letter writing but who the Faul family only saw decades later on brief visits, or never met at all. Now, long after Barbara’s death, there remain dozens of pictures of people the artist has no tangible connection with or knowledge of. They are family but unfamiliar.
With a series of collages, Faul is exploring personal history by combining the mysterious photographs with another redundant technology — blank CDs. CD’s were a similar way to keep records and memories but which are now merely destined for the recycling bin. By assembling disparate images and ideas she aims to draw out snippets of information, or imagine brief moments, in the lives of these relatives who are strangers.
About Chutespace
In November 2013 the former Griffith Library after-hours book-returns chute was transformed by Jeffree Skewes and Kerry Shepherdson, into a distinctive miniature exhibition space named CHUTESPACE.
CHUTESPACE is an artist run initiative and continues to be voluntarily curated and managed. Artists of all genres can apply for an exhibition.
Mini exhibitions are featured for four-week periods in line with the M16 main gallery exhibition periods.
All artist proposals are considered, and exhibitions are free to the artist.