1998

Arkley’s works appeared in several significant exhibitions, nationally and internationally, during the year. His suburban imagery continued to feature prominently, for example in the Sydney Biennale (Aug-Sept.1998), dedicated to the ‘Every Day’, which included two major new paintings, Riteroom and Superb + Solid.[1]

The gap between Arkley’s imagery and the houses he represented seemed to be narrowing considerably in some viewers’ perception, to judge from various real estate stories illustrated with his images.[2] But two of the year’s major international touring shows (‘Claustrophobia’ and ‘Unhomely’) placed his suburban works into a more complicated context, involving the idea of domestic life as two-edged – both comfortable and strange.[3] ‘Claustrophobia’ firmly located Arkley (and Australian colleagues Carolyn Eskdale and Kathy Temin) in an international context. The exhibition, initiated by the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham, was shown in various British centres from June 1998 through to January 2000, and also included works by Rachel Whiteread, Mona Hatoum and others, in a searching analysis of the contradictions involved in our idea of ‘home’.[4]

Fabricated Rooms was exhibited for the first time in Victoria, in 1998, first at Benalla, in April (where it was opened by Betty Churcher, former director of the National Gallery of Australia), and then at the end of the year at Tolarno, together with a major series of new 3-D works and paintings, described collectively as ‘Sampling’, arranged in a showroom setting evoking home furnishing shops and decorator sources – key reference points for the artist over many years.

In December, Arkley was announced as Australia’s chosen representative at the 48th Venice Biennale in 1999.[5]