Klea McKenna

Klea McKenna embodies the ideal of what defines contemporary photography, applying innovation to create unique photographic works of art with striking detail and immaterial abstraction (Figures 1 and 2). In her series Automatic Earth, McKenna underscores the materiality of photograms, hand embossing the “rings of cross sections of trees and into cracks in the earth” to create imprints of their surfaces on photographic paper. McKenna then exposes the imprinted substrate to light, producing what the artist defines as a “photographic relief” (McKenna 2023). As seen in the images that are the foundation of Trust, Possibilities and Spheres – that acknowledge the rejuvenation of Melbourne’s inner-city waterways and parklands – the artist honours the histories of the referents through physical engagement with her techniques, equipment and subject matter to reveal profound nuance and energy.

Klea McKenna, Your Generation, 2016, photographic rubbing, unique gelatin silver photogram, 610x940mm

Klea McKenna, Motherland #2, 2017, photographic rubbing, unique gelatin silver photogram, 1524x1524mm

Bibliography

McKenna, Klea. 2016. Your Generation. Image. https://www.euqinomgallery.com/mckenna_automaticearth.

McKenna, Klea. 2017. Motherland #2. Image. https://www.euqinomgallery.com/mckenna_automaticearth.

McKenna, Klea. 2023. “Automatic Earth”. ISSUU. PDF. https://issuu.com/euqinomprojects/docs/klea_mckenna_automatic_earth_available_inventory.