Victoria King

artist, writer

Come, see real

flowers

of this painful world.

Basho (1644-1694)

What does it mean to feel a sense of belonging, to be embodied and present in a specific place? Or to feel out of place, displaced, unconnected to ourselves and others? Can the woodlands, mountains, streams, rivers, seas, deserts, grasslands, towns, and cities of our childhood influence our sense of self and continue to resonate within us as adults? How important is nature when so many of us by necessity or choice live in cities? Does having a connection to the place we live really matter?

As an artist and writer who lived for decades in each of three countries - America, England, and Australia - I asked myself these questions as I observed my artwork radically change with conscious and unconscious intent in relation to the places where I lived. I began to do research which resulted in my PhD: Art of Place and Displacement: Embodied Perception and the Haptic Ground (2005, UNSW). It included material from the time I spent with the Canadian-American artist Agnes Martin in Taos, New Mexico, and my experiences volunteering with Aboriginal women artists for five years at the remote Aboriginal outstation of Utopia in the Northern Territory of Australia.

My paintings, sculptures, ceramics, photography, poetry, and essays reflect the power of place, displacement, and nature. In my writing, I combine research with reflections on my art practice, life and journeys across countries and cultures. My writing has been published in books and international journals, and my artwork has been chosen for nine book covers. I have had over sixty art exhibitions, including fourteen solo exhibitions. A curated 25-year solo curated retrospective of my work was shown in two public venues in Australia in 2005, and a 40-year solo museum retrospective of my artwork was held in England between November 2021 and March 2022.

Giovanni Aloi, editor of Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, interviewed me about Australian Aboriginal art and culture and my experiences at Utopia for the Antennae Spring 2023 edition, Issue 60. It can be freely downloaded as a back issue at: https://www.antennae.org.uk/back-issues-1

Spirit Ground, my essay on Agnes Martin's art and life in the American Southwest can be read at this link: Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology, Summer/Fall 2024, Volume 35, No. 2.

Poem by Matsuo Basho (1644 - 1694) from On Love and Barley: Haiku of Basho © Penguin Classics, 1985.

Top photo: Memento Mori sculpture series. Plaster-drenched recycled fabric over found objects.

Above left: mono print on recycled paper, large stoneware sculptural ceramics from recycled clay, and recycled paper pulp sculpture with discarded pigments and handmade plant pigments.

© Copyright of text and artwork Dr. Victoria King 2025.

For information about sizes or prices, please email: vkblackstone@gmail.com

Insta: vikiking1951