National Museum of Australia

Andrew Zukoski

DIGITAL MEDIA

Artist biography

Andrew Zukoski is an exchange student studying at the Australian National University for a year, on loan from Rice University in Houston, Texas.

He works mostly with video and sound, and is very interested in interactive technologies and the possibilities for video beyond the frame.

His work is often influenced by his nearly-complete studies as an engineer, drawing inspiration from the worlds of science and technology.

Artist statement

The Australian Journeys exhibition showcases objects that travelled to or from Australia. In making these crossings, the objects have brought with them an aura of their previous locations; they are representative of their home cultures, or transmit some reminder of love separated by oceans.

This definition of Australia in terms of its component relationships with the rest of the world blurs the boundaries of the continent, confuses and interlinks the lives of the people on both sides of the border. My piece examines this through video projections and readings of Walt Whitman.

Artist work

Title: Listener up there ...

Medium: Video
Date: May 2009

Black and white image of two groups of four people with outstretched arms

View Andrew Zukoski's Listener up there ... (MPEG4 31mb) duration 4:36

Artist inspiration

Convict tokens

Some 160,000 convicts were sent to the Australian colonies from 1788 to 1868. One of those convicts was Thomas Lock. He was convicted of highway robbery and sentenced to 10 years' transportation to New South Wales. Before Lock left England, as he waited in prison for his sentence to be carried out, he used a penny to make a token of remembrance to leave behind. The inscription reads:

WHEN / THIS YOU / SEE / REMEMBER /
ME WHEN / I AM FAR / FROM the[e] /
THOMAS / LOCK / AGED 22 / TRANSPed /
10 Years

Lock gave this memento to a loved one when he sailed for Australia. He arrived in Sydney in September 1845. It is not known if he ever returned to England.

Convict token in the form of a circular copper disc stipple-engraved with 'THOMAS / LOCK / AGED 22 / TRANSPed / 10 Years" is impressed in side one, and "WHEN / THIS YOU / SEE / REMEMBER / ME WHEN / I AM FAR / FROM THE [sic]' is in side two.

Photo: Dragi Markovic.