Shaun Wilson: Death of the Father

The subject of this article is Shaun Wilson, an Australian visual artist who is recognised for his video artworks that focus upon images of home and domestic space. Wilson’s artworks signify family and, through memory, are manifestations of house and home. I will demonstrate how Wilson has used the art of memory (a memory technique attributed to the ancient Greek poet Simonides of Ceos) as a creative tool to position his art in the Australian domestic space. Wilson’s video artworks originate from a specific event in his life: the death of his much-loved father, Peter, in 1999. In the process I believe Wilson has created a new video version of the Australian house and home, one scripted on the continual understanding of coming to terms with his father’s death. To demonstrate this hypothesis, I will discuss Wilson’s pivotal interpretation of the impact of his father’s death, Uber Nocturnus Acts I to IV, 2008. In the Uber Nocturnus series Shaun Wilson is presenting memory as a false recollection; the viewer recalls these images but now these are remixed and transported to a different time. Dark and foreboding in style, these videos explore the other side of the domestic space, the betrayal of family.