Lot 49

Lindberg Galleries, Melbourne 2023
Private collection, Melbourne

Stephen Baker: Teenage Delinquents 'Truancy in the Age of Enlightenment', Lindberg Galleries, Melbourne, 18 August - 9 September 2023

"'Teenage Delinquents ‘Truancy in the Age of Enlightenment' is a collection of new works created over the past six months, however some of the original ideas for the show stem back to 2018 and have lay dormant until now. They follow a group of friends for an evening as they escape the dogmatic law-governed world and revel in those charming moments some of us have as teenagers. Whilst producing this series I pondered my own philosophical position in the world and my somewhat juxtaposed views on spirituality and reason. I consider myself a modern thinker who would look to science and fact for rational judgment. However, I also enjoy the stories told in more spiritually invested lore, filled with enchantment and imagination.

It's this idea of capturing enchanted moments in real life that has found me moving closer towards the fantastical. Capturing the essence of a ‘real' moment by constructing a more heightened reality, a blurred line between fact or fiction." (excerpt, Artist statement)