Bronwyn Rennex - small fires

Part strange x-ray, part somnambulist vision there is a quiet but fascinating immediacy and authenticity to these works.

Craig Judd, 2004

In her latest body of work small fires, Bronwyn Rennex uses one of the oldest photographic techniques, the cyanotype, to give voice to contemporary concerns. As in previous bodies of works, Rennex takes ordinary elements and transforms them into extraordinary suggestions. She takes the literal shadow, captured in the cyanotype process, and turns it into a figurative shadow - a suggestion of the unconscious and unspoken.

Difficulties and confusions are made explicit. Gentle tendrils of grapevine speak out "thanks for nothing" or "no no no". The words are plaintive, confusing and fallible. In Headless, 2004 a headless torso holds a head at arms length.

There is a tension in the works, as the title of the series suggests, small fires can become big fires or they can go out. They are small and intense - dangerous yet fragile.

Rennex's work has previously been featured in Smart Art in Australian Art Collector Magazine (2001). She has also been included in the Australian Photographic Portrait Prize at the AGNSW both in 2003 and 2004. Her work is held in many private collections.