Ref.
Caves Gallery, 2022
Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Awards, 2023

Ref. is a large square beading composed of 52,000 24-karat gold beads and containing 18 lines of coded language. The text embedded within the work is drawn from emails sent and received over a two-year period in direct correspondence between myself and institutions in the legal and healthcare sectors. The title, Ref., evokes multiple meanings — referral, reference, referee, refusal — and points to the layered ways institutional communication can shape how information moves and how it is received.

The work considers how emails and other forms of bureaucratic communication can gatekeep, reroute, and contain complaints, often under the guise of collegiality or procedural neutrality. Ref. draws attention to the ways in which people’s accounts and lines of enquiry are interrupted, fragmented, and extended through referral systems. It also explores how generalised and hegemonic communication can generate faultless paper trails that absolve institutions of responsibility while simultaneously dehumanising the individuals they refer.