Omar | Van Wonderland

One of the creative people I have met on the Van Wonderland exhibition trail is Omar Misa. When the Design Centre staff came into work one Monday, their desks were sporting little croquet creatures. Omar had been crocheting them while volunteering over the weekend.

Since then Omar has made quite a few creatures and other oddments that have been exhibited and sold. It was great talking to someone with such a gentle outlook, he was taught to crochet by his mum and has kept going. I have seen what he is producing for the Van Wonderland exhibition and it certainly isn’t your usual nanna crochet.

Van Wonderland is an exhibition of work by contemporary crafts practitioners exploring a mysterious world of not-quite-real objects and creatures, based upon historic western perceptions of Tasmania (‘Van Diemen’s Land’) as a distant and little-known island at the far reaches of the globe.

This ‘new world’, full of strange and exotic flora and fauna, could be by turns beautiful and sinister – just as the strange Wonderland explored so famously by Lewis Carroll’s Alice.

Step into Van Wonderland and explore the mysteries within. And don’t forget to take your teacup.

Participating artists include Tara Badcock, The Purple Finch, Erin Tappe, Hideyo, Cat Badcock, Ghostpatrol, Megan Perkins, Omar Misa, Helen Goninon, and Anita Dineen with accompanying photography by Alan Moyle (Photobat).

Come to the opening, Friday 18th September 2009 at 6 pm, Design Centre, Tamar Street, Launceston, RSVP by email or by 6331 5505. Exhibition open until the 18th of October.