Monday, December 20, 2010

Holiday opening times


Hi all -

Hand Held will be open right up until Christmas Eve - we've got lots of great little goodies that would make great Kris Kringles and one-off unique Christmas gifts.

We will reopen on the 4th of Jan - 8th Jan for the completion of Mel Cameron and Chloe Vallance's beautiful show and then re-open again on the 13th for the opening of Kathy Fahey's show 'Penang and Back'. New Gallery hours (Tue-Sat, 12-5pm) will kick in after that. Please note we will not open on Mondays this coming year - I wish we could but work commitments are getting in the way.

Have a lovely Chistmas!

Friday, December 17, 2010

'Measuring the Space Between' by Chloe Vallance and Melissa Cameron opened last week at Hand Held. A exhibition by Chloe - an illustrator - and Melissa - a jeweller - both emerging artists in the Melbourne scene - is an exciting collaboration where the artists have responded to and expanded on each others work and practice.

Both Chloe and Melissa play with the notion of 'space' within their work in different ways and this exhibition creates a meeting point - between two artists - between the object and the void - between memory and imagination.














Thursday, November 25, 2010


Illustrator Chloe Vallance and Jeweller Melissa Cameron team up for an exciting exhibition at Hand Held next month. Opening Thursday 9th December, 'Measuring the Space Between is a collaborative exhibition where the artists have responded to each others work, swapping pieces halfway through - altering and building upon what the other has begun.

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Sandra Winkworth's beautiful exhibition 'Sleeping Beauties' opened last Thursday night.

Sandra has deconstructed abandoned, decaying books and re-worked them to hold colourful studies drawn from the thousands of birds stored in the Macleay collection at the University of Sydney.

The works draw you in with their delicate beauty yet lead you consider decay, destruction, extinction...

























































Thanks to all of you who came along to support an interstate artist exhibiting here in Melbourne for the first time!

The Exhibition continues until December 4th.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Sleeping Beauties


Sandra Winkworth's exhibition 'Sleeping Beauties' opens Thursday night at Hand Held from 6-8pm.


Sleeping Beauties focuses on the bird and the unwanted book to explore issues of loss and denial. Discarded books are reworked to hold images of bird studyskins sourced from a 19th century collection at the University of Sydney’s Macleay Museum.

'Here the bird is out of context, outside of nature and perhaps is a reminder of our tenuous connections with the natural world.'

If you are in Melbourne on Thursday eve drop by and support one of our interstate artists over a glass of vino!









Monday, October 4, 2010

Tiny Peeks now on





















Tiny Peeks opened last Thursday eve with a fantastic turn out of 70+ revelers. Here is a little glimpse of the work on show - come in to the gallery before October 27 to see the work up close and check out the cool window art created by the by the silent army (Micheal Fikaris, Jo Waite and co.) For more info on future shows check out the link www.silentarmy.org


Also available on the night was the tiny peeks anthology/chap book/catalogue. Although we sold out on opening night, there will hopefully be more available throughout the show.

Monday, September 27, 2010

Tiny Peeks


Join us on Thursday September 30 at Hand Held
6-8pm
for the opening of
'Tiny Peeks'
Michael P Fikaris curates an exhibition of one page comics reflecting on the everyday. Artists in no particular order are: Pip Stafford, Amber Carvan, Tim Molloy, James James, Ben Hutchings, Jase Harper, Mandy Ord, Mel Roswell, Anthony Woodward, Tom O'hern, Kirsty Madden, Michael Hawkins, Richard Butler-Bowden, Ghostpatrol, M.P.Fikaris, Jo Waite, Athonk, Phoenix, Ha - Ha, Cut, Rena Littleson, No Frills Art, Toni Ann, Tim Danko, Indira Neville, Daniel Reed, Anna Brown, John Weeks, Alice Mrongovius

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Sarah Ritchie: Select

Sarah Ritchie's beautiful exhibition opened Thursday eve here at Hand Held. A clear and concise body of work Sarah's books reflect on collection, museum, display and exhibition. Each piece represents a miniature museum cabinet filled with museum-esque objects . I love that from afar this exhibition reads as clean, crisp, starkly black and cream, and beautiful but when you get up close and look inside you begin to question, filled with a sense of uneasiness you wonder what it is you are looking at...




























































'Select' considers the act of collection and display. Small objects and book works are presented as pseudo-museum cabinets in miniature. Personal and intimate in stature and material they may be folded closed at will, safely hidden and secreted away, limited in view. The miniature cabinets are constructed from digitally and traditionally printed papers and allude to replicas and models, perhaps samples for theatre designs and sets. Small worlds of ambiguous objects are contained within each fragile paper cabinet –anatomical viscera or unnamed biological specimens? With reference to historical medical imaging, cabinets of curiosity as well as classical architecture, Select reflects on the potent relationship between the frame and the object contained within. - Sarah Ritchie