emma johnson

I am delighted to be involved in Tony Kearney’s “KNOT” exhibition in Port Adelaide, part of this year’s Adelaide Fringe Festival. If you are in Adelaide, pop in and have a look!

“Before there was superglue and PVA, before nuts and bolts, it was knots that held the world together.

Bowline, Hangman’s Noose, Monkey Fist, Half Hitch, Rolling Hitch, Clove Hitch, Trucker’s Hitch, Sheepshank, Sheet Bend, Slip, Knit, Purl and Figure-Eight. All secure to the Bitter End.

We have knots for knickers and knackers, in all things woven and stitched, in baskets, rugs, clothes, when getting hitched, lacing shoes, tying a tie, knots to make string into nets, knots in wood, in the stomach, in muscles, in love. Knots of speed to tell how fast your boat’s going or the wind’s blowing.

The exhibition KNOT is the fifth in a series of exhibitions by a group of contemporary artists that deal with a single word theme, the first being RUST, SALT, TAR and SMOKE. We’re expecting KNOT to be just as surprising and inventive.”

Title: “Bottle of Smoke”

Year made: 2014

Media: Old Smoke (Dissected Ordnance Survey map of London – ignited), sent from England to Port Adelaide in a glass bottle.

The Old Smoke

Through the 19th early 20th century, Londoners used coal fires, which produced large amounts of smoke. This culminated in the disastrous Great Smog of 1952 which lasted for five days and killed over 4,000 people. The Clean Air Act was passed in 1956; however the nickname is still used. Many cities have since acquired the nickname “The Smoke”, but London was the first, hence “The Old Smoke”.

Molotov cocktail

The Molotov cocktail (named after Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov) is a generic name used for a bottle-based improvised incendiary weapon. A glass bottle contains a flammable substance such as gasoline/petrol, and a source of ignition such as a burning cloth wick, which is lit and the bottle hurled at a target. When the bottle smashes, the cloud of petrol droplets and vapour ignites causing a fireball.

Bottle of Smoke

A song by Shane MacGowan & Jem Finer, from the album “If  I Should Fall From Grace With God” (The Pogues, 1988).