Sydney
9 December 2001

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Ban all human cloning – bishops

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Christian, Buddhist themes meld in Blake Prize winner

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Inspirations: Treasures from the past: a holiday treat

Christian, Buddhist themes meld in Blake Prize winner

Lachlan Warner and his winning entry in the 50th anniversary Blake Prize

By Kathleen Carmody

Sydney artist Lachlan Warner’s background is Christian but he’s been a practising Buddhist for the past four years.

During that time, his works have taken on an increasingly spiritual element.

The fusing of his spiritual and artistic practice paid off last week when he was declared the winner of the $10,000 Blake Prize for Religious Art in its 50th anniversary year.

The prize has been sponsored by the Australian Catholic University for the past two years.

Warner’s prize-winning work – an installation of hollow Buddhas made of coloured foil Easter egg wrappers – consciously seeks to connect Buddhism and Christianity and to expose the increasing commercialisation of both religions.

“(It’s about) what connects them, but also what connects them that isn’t so good,” he says. “We’ve seen over the years the total commercialisation of Christmas and the commercialisation of Easter.

“And I think it’s really sad because we’re missing out on an extraordinary message.”

Easter, he says, should be a time of reflection; a quiet time, but instead has become a gaudy holiday – “Easter equals Easter eggs and gaudy shop displays and so forth”.

Warner used a variety of Buddhist icons as moulds (and ate a lot of chocolate). The result, he says, is a shop case full of “unconsumable consumables”.

He describes the work as simultaneously a critique and a celebration of the commodification of spiritual or religious iconography.

“It’s about consumerism, (but) it’s also a celebration of the aesthetic of Thai and Tibetan Buddhism that’s very loud and lavish and wonderful like that,” he says. “It plays on a number of different areas for me.”

Warner expects people will come to his work with totally different views. He is also prepared for the possibility of some taking offence at what could be seen as the parodying of Buddha.

“A Buddhist will come to it with a different view than a Christian,” he says. “Some might take umbrage. I hope they wouldn’t be insulted by it, but that’s possible, too.”

People seeking spiritual inspiration in his work will probably be disappointed.

“It’s about a current debate,” the artist says. “It has a certain political strength to it – that is for me the main thing. I don’t think this is about inspiration – this is not that sort of work. I think there are other people’s (works) that do that better than me.”

The work – Vitrine of lightweight (Sunyata), disposable Buddhas, in a range of festive colours, postures and mudras – also serves as a warning against taking religion too seriously.

The ACU has also pledged a further $10,000 towards an upcoming book commemorating 50 years of the Blake Prize which is being collated by Rosemary Crumlin, RSM.

The Blake Prize exhibition is at the SH Ervin Gallery at the Rocks until December 23.