Darren Tanny Tan is a Singapore-born artist living and working in Melbourne/Naarm.
Through the presence of the body and the evocation of the natural world, Tan’s works reflect on the imperceptible forces that affect human existence. His work commonly features a consideration of materiality and he employs unorthodox processes as part of his practice, which can include the destruction of the image.
This is part of his sustained meditation on morality and impermanence, and his work at once examines and betrays notions of history, the body, and their representations. NotFair was founded in 2010 by artists Sam Leach and Tony Lloyd – who then invited writer Ashley Crawford to join their curatorial team – as a satellite event to the Melbourne Art Fair, in order to showcase independent artists who often do not fit the commercial mould and are overlooked and under-recognized. The initial grass roots event has grown into a well-known and popular event on the Australian arts calendar.
Now in its 10th year |notfair| has launched many artists into successful careers, while the nature of the event is still unchanged: we do things differently.
NotFair aims to be a low-cost event in order to ensure that the artists can secure a higher percentage of the sale price. This also ensures that |notfair| can continue to take risks, exhibit the unusual and the experimental. The glue that binds this, say the curators, is the choice of artists who carry integrity, talent and devotion to their craft while being unafraid to take risks. Most of our participating artists are independent and are not represented by a commercial gallery. NotFair becomes a stage where artists, dealers, collectors and art lovers find each other and new relationships are formed.
Working in an expanded field of photography, Darren Tanny Tan’s practice at once examines and betrays notions of the body and its representations. Central to his approach are unorthodox image-making processes through which destructive impulses are sublimated and expressed in the rupturing of surfaces.
In this series of images, Tanny Tan adopts what can be described as a ‘Sadean fascination’ with the body as anchorage to the psychical and its vulnerability to suffering. Employing a haptic manipulation of photographic material, he defaces his subjects and renders them into phantasmagoric figures that revel in dread and desire.
Tanny Tan holds a Bachelor of Design (RMIT), a Bachelor of Photography (Photography Studies College), and is currently undertaking a Master of Contemporary Art at the Victorian College of the Arts.
Our entire team consists of volunteers who tirelessly contribute out of love for the arts. We would like to extend our gratitude to all of you who have helped us over the years to make NotFair possible.