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Details
- Date
- 1998
- Media category
- Sculpture
- Materials used
- 80 carved soap, painted bank notes in a vitrine
- Dimensions
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174.0 x 132.2 x 57.2 cm approx. overall
:
cccc - vitrine/ stand, 114 x 130.3 x 54.2 cm, vitrine
cccc - vitrine/ stand, 60 x 132.2 x 57.2 cm, plinth
- Signature & date
Not signed. Not dated.
- Credit
- Contemporary Collection Benefactors 2000
- Location
- Not on display
- Accession number
- 54.2000.a-dddd
- Copyright
- © Fiona Hall
- Artist information
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Fiona Hall
Works in the collection
- Share
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About
'Cash Crop' consists of a vitrine filled with little sculptures of fruit and vegetables carved from a variety of natural soaps. These pieces of 'fruit' are accompanied by labels and painted bank notes. The terms appearing on the labels are taken from the language of economic activity. The juxtapositions are both amusing and sharply critical: 'liquid asset' is a grape; 'share market float' is a lotus; 'tax return' is a peanut; 'global liquidity' is a cola nut.
In 'Cash Crop', Fiona Hall explores the connections between trade, natural resources and botany. These concerns have been central to Hall's body of work since the 1970s. Soap is destroyed by water: it is ephemeral and changing. Commerce and trade, too, change with the slides in 'global liquidity'. Botany, like trade, is a system: of classification and collection. Botany is a science developed in order to 'collect' the world of nature. Cash Crop is about the exploitation of natural resources for commercial interests and the artifice of classification.
Julie Ewington writes, "Sir Joseph Banks created elaborate cabinets for the exploration voyages of James Cook, in which numerous specimens of plants were taken back to England, studied, dissected, analysed and planted. Later, the economic uses of collected plants were investigated, for medicine, cosmetics, prophylactics and profit... Fiona Hall has selectively emphasised the tendency towards conjoined terms in systems of Western classification. This is not a merely whimsical rubbing together of similarities, differences, binaries: it is a purposeful play between different orders of things, set up to embrace, pull apart, to slip and to slide".
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Audio
Cash crop - Fiona Hall 2:34
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Exhibition history
Shown in 5 exhibitions
Cash Crop, Institute of Modern Art, Fortitude Valley, 08 Oct 1998–31 Oct 1998
Cash Crop - an art exhibition by Fiona Hall, Brisbane Botanic Gardens, Brisbane, 20 Nov 1998–29 Nov 1998
Fieldwork, Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Paddington, 29 Sep 1999–23 Oct 1999
Fiona Hall, Queensland Art Gallery, South Brisbane, 19 Mar 2005–05 Jun 2005
Fiona Hall, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 15 Jul 2005–18 Sep 2005
Fiona Hall: Force Field, Museum of Contemporary Art, Australia, 06 Mar 2008–01 Jun 2008
Fiona Hall: Force Field, City Gallery Wellington, Wellington, 28 Jun 2008–19 Oct 2008
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Bibliography
Referenced in 10 publications
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Natasha Bullock, Contemporary: Art Gallery of New South Wales Contemporary Collection, 'Landscape, mapping, nature', pg.290-331, Sydney, 2006, 310, 311 (colour illus.).
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Laura Murray Cree, Art and Australia (Vol. 37, No. 4), 'Something of value: An interview with Tony Palmer', pg. 580-589, Sydney, Jun 2000-Aug 2000, 582, 583 (colour illus.), 587.
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Julie Ewington, Fiona Hall, 'Contemporary vernaculars', pg.124-153, Annandale, 2005, 142, 143 (colour illus.). illustration is a detail
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Julie Ewington, Artlink [vol. 19, no. 4], 'Cash Crop', pg.41-43, Henley Beach, Dec 1999, cover (colour illus.), 41 (illus.), 42-43 (colour illus.), 41-43. all 3 illustrations are details
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Institute of Modern Art (Organiser), Cash Crop, Brisbane, 1998.
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Timothy Morrell, Art Monthly Australia, 'Fiona Hall: Cash crop', pg.4-5, Canberra, Nov 1999, inside cover (illus.), back cover (colour illus.), 5 (illus.), 4-5. all 3 illustrations are details
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Timothy Morrell, Eyeline, 'Fiona Hall: Cash Crop', Brisbane, Summer 1998-1999, 38 (illus.). illustration is a detail
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Sebastian Smee, The Sydney Morning Herald, 'Concepts take root', Sydney, 05 Oct 1999. Review in 'The galleries' section
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Russell Storer, Federation: Australian art and society 1901-2001, 'Leaf litter', pg. 211, Canberra, 2000, 211.
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Andrew Frost (Chief writer), Australian art collector, 'Australia's 50 most collectable artists', pg.59-96, Sydney, Jan 2000-Mar 2000, 70 (colour illus.). illustration is a detail
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