Pat Brassington

In the monograph of Pat Brassington's work released last year Dr Anne Marsh writes of Brassington's work that it "presents puzzles for the viewer and pushes us to the boundaries where ideas and images collide." This continues to be the strength and the fascination of Brassington's images. They make us think. Sometimes they make us laugh or recoil or wonder - but they always make us think.

In her new Cambridge Road series, Brassington eschews the technique of computer assisted collage favoured in many of her recent works and instead focuses on a series of images, which appear at first glance to be straightforward.

Of course, nothing Brassington produces is ever straightforward and this set of images featuring young women and an almost empty house is no exception. In their somehow dispassionate framing and simplicity the works suggest the forensic. A fully clothed woman lies curled in a bathtub, eyes closed, almost peaceful. Two women pose in a carpeted room furnished only by a strange box in the corner - one wears a mask. At times a flare of light or a mark of processing suggests something almost spectral in the frame. As with Brassington's other works, narratives arise like smoke from a fire, but nothing is certain.

In addition to this new body of work and to mark the publication last year of the monograph Stills Gallery will also be presenting a selection of Brassington's earlier works. Some of these works will be seen in Sydney for the first time in many years, including Fragments of Memory, 1992.

Pat Brassington is one of Australia's leading photomedia artists. She has exhibited widely both in Australia and overseas for the past 20 years. Her work was selected for inclusion in the Biennale of Sydney in 2004. Her work is held in many private and public collections including the Art Gallery of NSW, Queensland Art Gallery, National Gallery of Australia, Tasmanian Museum & Art Gallery, National Gallery of Victoria and Artbank. A major retrospective of her work was held at the Ian Potter Centre, University of Melbourne in August 2002 and she was included in Photographica Australis (curated by Alasdair Foster - Director of the ACP) at ARCO in Madrid 2002.