Book chapter
Formal Dramas/Opaque Poeticisms/Mystery Assemblages
Mitch Cairns: Artist's Mouth, pp.23-30
National Art School and Institute of Modern Art
05/2026
Metrics
2 Record Views
Abstract
Conundrums are at the heart of Mitch Cairns’s work. The Sydney artist’s pictures verge on the cartoonish, yet many wouldn’t look out of place in the erudite cubist salons of 1910s Paris. Cairns’s numerous working-man references—to bricklayers, beer, factories, and 9-to-5 terminology—often sit unproblematically alongside more gentlemanly tropes, such as chandeliers, fountain pens, pianos, and top hats. Even a cloud can be paradoxical in Cairns’s world, appearing ephemeral even if resembling pleats of fabric.
When considering the breadth of works Cairns has produced over the last twenty or so years, local subjects (such as TAFE, Geraldine Doogue, or the regional city of Wollongong) have increasingly been offset by more nonspecific olde-worlde signifiers. All this amounts to uncertainty over how to characterise him as an artist. In front of his work, I’m constantly wondering if Cairns scrutinises reality or tries to escape it. Is he a storytell er or an obfuscator? Is his Wes Anderson–like Europeanism a form of cultural satire or cultural cringe?
Details
- Title
- Formal Dramas/Opaque Poeticisms/Mystery Assemblages
- Creators
- Wes Hill Dr - Southern Cross University
- Contributors
- Lucy Latella (Editor)Robert Leonard (Editor)
- Publication Details
- Mitch Cairns: Artist's Mouth, pp.23-30
- Publisher
- National Art School and Institute of Modern Art; Sydney, Australia
- Identifiers
- 991013372059602368
- Copyright
- © National Art School Limited, Institute of Modern Art, the artist, and authors.
- Academic Unit
- Faculty of Education
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Book chapter