Robbie Austin

[Six works on paper]*, 2025
archival records and paperwork from Syriaque and Victoria Curole
12″ x 12″ each

My art practices have thrived by reinterpreting order and how chaos plays an important role in that formation. Memories become stories. Dreams get retold. Notes change hands. Diagrams, maps, and correspondence that were once informative become reinterpreted with time. 

Muddy water, let stand, becomes clear. -Lao Tzu

As I listened to dozens of interviews and perused hundreds of artifacts, all that were provided to me by Victoria Bradford Styrbicki for the Caught Up Project, fluid overlaps began to occur. I am a coastal Louisianian. Whether by geography, culture, or both, my formation for over fifty years has been to decipher how my consciousness, my philosophy, my genes, my pigment, and my faith connects me to the greater global community. What do I have to say? To make? To provide?

Caught Up infiltrated specific channels dealing with the humanity of love, misunderstanding, respect, finance, privacy, death, illness, nurturing, despair, anger, and blame. The input of these audial and visual got muddy quickly though I trusted the churn. Taking breaks, stepping away, and trusting that I belonged in this discussion and that overlaps in awareness would prevail and provide clarity kept me moving and sorting. 

The results of my communion with Caught Up are on display here. In making, I felt I had the power to divulge secrets but were any of these secrets worthy of being veiled? No. In conjunction with the audio heard in the immersive exhibit, the participants are invited to form their own conscience of divulgence. What will be done with the privilege of honest communication? My filters provided reverie about family and much I’ve taken for granted in being a coastal Louisianian. Victoria is casting a variety of nets. Elusiveness may be natural. We are proud private people. Stick around, let your head churn a bit. The clarity you receive this evening will be worth it.