Date: March 2006

Location: Sydney, Australia

Project: Exhibition

Partners: Belinda Franks, Kodak, MCA, Veuve Clicquot

Artists: Toni Collette + Sam Worthington

PONY is delighted to present the exhibition ‘Duality: A Perspective on Two’ featuring a series of photographic works by two of Australia’s leading creatives, Toni Collette and Sam Worthington. Each artist used a dual-lens camera to create a series of responses in large format printed on Kodak Endura Metallic paper. Held at Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) for one night only, the artists’ series of work is deeply personal and a reflection of individual exploration based on themes of duality.

Sam Worthington produced a haunting series of work through playing with long exposure to manipulate focus, composition and colour. 

“Duality, the condition of one thing having two sides, parts, or faces; pairs of inter-connected opposites, neither of which can exist without the other. I strove in a matter of days to conquer the concept of 'duality' - but luckily the concept conquered me. For several days I struggled to use the idea as a jumping-off point, to create, to frame, to ignite. I argued with my muse - over its definition, over whether the images truly reflected 'duality'. Everywhere I looked my mind found it, fought it, ran with it, stalled in blankness. I hated the task and fell deeply in love with it. If a photograph is a flat surface, then its duality is that it goes far beyond its two dimensions. Potentially it offers spirit and depth beyond what our rational mind tends to define duality as” _Sam Worthington

Toni Collette’s work is urban reportage, capturing everyday imagery that evokes a conceptual thread of the curatorial theme. 

“To me, life is duality. The very fact that we are encompassed in our bodies but live, mostly, elsewhere in our minds. That two people can connect and make a new person. Light and dark. Earth and sky. Good and bad. Awake and asleep. Sun and moon. Now and forever. That tears can fall from both joy and sadness. We can present the person we want to be seen as and live with the truth of who we are. We know we are going to die and still waste time worrying about insignificant things. We can love so much that it hurts. We fear so much but are too scared to confront it, change it. We are nature itself and yet we believe we are separate from it and try to dominate it as though we are not all one. We think we are alone despite the fact that we breathe the same breath and are filled with the same spirit of life. Life is experienced through our relationships with everything. Not just people but EVERYTHING. It takes two to tango.” _Toni Collette