Sunspot AR3505 and Ode to the Last Bikini are artworks that pay homage to our fraught relationship with the sun as we experience rapid and increasing climate change. No more seeking the perfect tan, in the perfect bikini. Now we reach for hats, long sleeves, sunscreen, and shade in today’s quickly burning world. Preserved in salt, the bikini has become an artifact, a fleeting, and wistful memory of our past.
Elaine Whittaker, Ode to the Last Bikini, Synthetic nylon fabric, salt, grown salt crystals, 30 x 20 x 30 cm (11.8 × 7.9 × 11.8 in), 2024.
Elaine Whittaker, Sunspot AR3505, synthetic yarn knotted on metal scaffold, 40.6 × 40.6 × 17.8 cm (16 x 16 x 7 in), 2024.
Member since: 2004
Number of exhibitions at the gallery: 10 solo exhibitions
Tell us a story about Red Head: I am deeply grateful to all the passionate artists that I’ve had the privilege of working with in the collective. Their dedication to the gallery is truly inspiring. I have lost track of how many years I served as Treasurer, but there is nothing more rewarding than presenting the latest financial statement, saying, “Well, everyone, we are finally out of debt, and we even have a surplus!”
I am grateful to all the poets, musicians and dancers who have engaged with my artwork and brought their communities to the gallery.
In 2010, I presented my exhibition entitled (in)trepid cultures. For the last evening of the show, I brought together nine poets to give readings on the theme of Beauty and Terror. One poet, R. M. Vaughan, was terrified of just being in the gallery with live bacteria on the walls (in petri dishes). He read his poem, apologized, and quickly left. I know my BioArtworks have been called a ‘fascinating perversity’ (BlogTO review), but I could not assure Richard that he was not in any danger.
Elaine Whittaker is a multidisciplinary artist intersecting art, science, medicine, and ecology. Her installations, sculptures, and mixed media artworks incorporate traditional and unconventional materials including paint, mosquitoes, salt crystals, human/animal cells, textiles, repurposed fibres, and live microorganisms. She has exhibited in art and science galleries and museums in North & South America, Europe, China, South Korea, and Australia including the Centre Pompidou (France), Gwacheon National Science Museum (South Korea), London Science Gallery (UK), and the McMaster Museum of Art (Canada); and is featured in journals and books on BioArt, new media and medicine.
