Dear Neighbour

Next date: Friday, 01 December 2023 | 05:00 PM to Friday, 12 January 2024 | 05:00 PM

Wendy Catling, Untitled, 2021, pigment print

Since 2021, Wendy Catling has captured photographs and collected texts that reflect subtle undercurrents of life in Ringwood, her home suburb in Naarm/Melbourne, Australia, through a period when the impact of social, technological and environmental factors continue to challenge the collective psyche.

“The project began with a fascination for disquieting signs of collective anxiety: cryptic street and bumper stickers, persistent electioneering and religious materials in my mailbox, unpredictable neighbourly disputes, a mysteriously placed car tyre, and homes shrouded in protective barriers. I joined social media community groups and discovered poetic and poignant detachment from IRL communion.

Guided by an expanded documentary process of portraying ideas through photographs and collected documents, and a non-linear narrative, Dear Neighbour is a personal search for belonging and community. It’s an exploration of the intricate language of the suburban environment I call home and the strangers who coexist alongside me. A visual and textual search for genuine community. Bringing our tensions and contradictions to the fore, I ask: Who is my neighbour? What does ‘a sense of community’ look like in the twenty-first century?”

Exhibition launch

Join us to celebrate the combined launch of Dear Neighbour and Drawing with Algorithms.

• Date: Thursday 16 November
• Time: 6.00pm to 7.30pm
• Venue: Maroondah Federation Estate, 32 Greenwood Avenue, Ringwood

RSVP online

When

Location

Maroondah Federation Estate Gallery, 32A Greenwood Avenue, Ringwood, 3134, View map