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THE EXPO 88 PHOTO SHOW – 35 years on

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First & Last EXPO PHOTO SHOW Poster

EXPO 88 – A conceptual photographer’s document

At this time thirty-five years ago the people of Brisbane were beginning their EXPO 88 six-month adventure opportunity to encounter the world and its cultures and cuisine. EXPO 88 is often seen as a watershed in the transformation of Brisbane as a sleepy backwater into a vibrant cosmopolitan city of the world and, most certainly part of the 21^st Century.

I had a season pass for EXPO 88 and created a personal body of work as a response to my experience of the event. As celebrations are beginning to hit the social media space I thought I would recollect on my WORLD EXPO 88 work.

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Here is the back-story behind my 1988 project … The First & Last EXPO PHOTO SHOW

EXPO 88 Crowd Crush ………..PHOTO: Ethyl Stevens aka Doug Spowart

Background to the EXPO Project:

In 1988 I was a co-director, with my mother Ruby Spowart, of the Artist Run Space, Imagery Gallery that was situated on the corner of Grey Street and Fish Lane in South Brisbane. Our gallery was situated just a short walk from the EXPO site and I had been commissioned to work on the display installations in some of the major pavilions. I also had a season pass to EXPO to create a resource body of work as a conceptual response to this significant international event. My work as a photographer at this time has simpatico with Sol Lewitt’s 1967 manifesto on conceptual art:

In conceptual art the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work. When an artist uses a conceptual form of art, it means that all of the planning and decisions are made beforehand and the execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea becomes a machine that makes the art. (Lewitt 1967)

WORLD EXPO 88 is now often seen as watershed in the transformation of Brisbane as a sleepy backwater into a vibrant cosmopolitan city of the world and, most certainly part of the 21^st Century. While the adventure of encountering the world and its cultures and cuisine was to form lasting memories for some others may have recollections of the crush of interstate and overseas visitors, the nightly flamboyant fireworks displays and the inevitable queuing to visit everything from food stalls, to exhibitions and toilets.

The Concept and Methodology of the EXPO Project:

As EXPO 88 emerged I recognised an opportunity for the creation of a new body of work investigating other approaches to my working methodology. For many reasons at this time I often worked with invented alias identities under which I could create new work. These identities were quite complete in that they had refined working styles, subject matter, presentation forms, signatures and artists statements. These personae enable me to challenge and critique the popular curatorial and academic perceptions of documentary and art photography. It also enabled me the freedom to explore and develop new personal directions through concepts of documentary photography.

When EXPO offered season passes I attended the passport portrait session with pair of fake glasses and a fictitious name, Eugene Xavier Pelham Owens, the initials and the signature spelled ‘EXPO’. With this first step, I now had the creative space to explore EXPO and the surreal cultural experience it represented. In time this project grew into an extensive body of work from 6 different personae all representing their manufactured personal responses to the EXPO experience.

The First & Last Photo Expo Show exhibition was opened on April 1^st 1989 (April Fools Day), it was reviewed positively in the Courier Mail (see attached) and sales of work resulted from people who found the photographs reconnecting them with their experience of the event.

The 1980s was a particularly productive period for me as I created a trilogy of exhibitions: Tourists Facts, Acts, Rituals and Relics (Araluen Art Gallery), Icons & Revered Australiana (Imagery Gallery & Rockhampton Library Gallery) and The First & Last Photo Expo Show.

Dr Doug Spowart