'Hand Made Strange' Artisan, Fortitude Valley

It could be said that the mark of a good metaphor is it's aversion to a precise and literal relationship to meaning. This might prove difficult for an artist using nylon stockings and table tennis balls. Loaded with potential associations, Rogers' everyday materials have histories as objects of utility, but also histories as containers of metaphor. Within art, literature and film, the stocking is often treated as a fetishistic or sensual item of clothing, an item that implies a feminine sexuality. The stocking also has the ability to communicate a sense of what is hidden and revealed in the same instance. Even with this weight of association and despite these materials assuming so many casual connections to the world itself, Rogers manages to transform the everyday through the simple manipulation of two objects coupled with the clever use of exhibition space. Spanning a gap between gallery walls, Untitled takes on a physicality that is strangely animal or even alien-like. Of course this is just one of many possible readings, and the description of an allegory has none the power of the allefory it describes. Rogers intentionally witholds from defining the textual content of her materials in order to engage the participatory mind in all the ways that she can. Written by Tim Woodward