Allusion & Illusion: the fantastical world of Valerie Sparks

Allusion & Illusion: the fantastical world of Valerie Sparks is the first in a series of annual exhibitions that profiles and explores the work of William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize alumni.

Valerie Sparks is a Melbourne-based artist who creates large-scale printed works and immersive installation environments. In 2016, Sparks won the Bowness Photography Prize for Prospero's Island – North East from the series Prospero's Island (2016). Sparks had been a finalist four times previously, but it was for this work that the judges awarded her the coveted prize. Her practice continues to interrogate the digital limits of photography, incorporating photomedia into large scale immersive commissions for public galleries and domestic interiors. Through her reinterpretation of French scenic wallpapers Sparks’ practice effortlessly merges art and design, creating engaging, impossibly perfect, immersive and beautiful environments for people to experience.

Valerie Sparks and the exhibition

Valerie Sparks has become known for sensuous and stunningly beautiful large scale works that entice the viewer with perfectly impossible landscapes. Each image is meticulously constructed using photographs she has taken of different landscapes populated with animals from museum collections.

MGA will exhibit Prospero's Island – North East with work that showcases the breadth of her practice starting with the Le Vol series. The Le Vol series was inspired by the 19th century French scenic wallpaper Le Bresil by Desfosse´ and resulted in large scale prints and luscious wallpaper installations. For the exhibition, Sparks has created an immersive large-scale wallpaper installation work based on the Le Vol series.

Sparks’ practice has always incorporated technology. She is currently embedded at Monash University as an Adjunct Senior Research Fellow at the Monash Immersive Visualisation Platform, New Horizons Research Centre which is providing her with access to new technologies including a 3D CAVE facility and the expertise of engineers and scientists from a variety of fields. The exhibition will showcase her recent 3D projections in which she captures points of light through cutting edge technology.