Glen Clarke

Glen Clarke is an Australian artist born in 1954 in Traralgon, Victoria. His multidisciplinary practice spans painting, collage, and sculpture, often exploring themes of war, displacement, and memory. Clarke gained national recognition after winning the 2006 National Sculpture Prize for his work American Crater Near Hanoi #2 . His intricate collages and installations frequently incorporate folded currency and military imagery, reflecting on the economic and human costs of conflict . Clarke’s works are held in major collections, including the Australian War Memorial and the National Gallery of Australia. He has also collaborated with humanitarian organizations like Project RENEW and MAG in Southeast Asia, contributing to mine risk education and unexploded ordnance clearance efforts.

“It is good luck to give or receive ‘New Money’ on special occasions, Luna New Year, Birthdays, Weddings etc. I only use new bank notes for folding little origami shirts that I nickname ‘Single Entities’, never before used, never to be used, never before spent, never to be spent, signifying a specific value but no longer valued as money, just another art material. This figurative shirt form can convey many interpretations, metaphors and connotations. I often use these shirts folded from world currencies as symbols of multiculturalism, cultural diversity, cultural potpourri. Sometimes I use the new money shirt symbol as groups, as demographics, as soldiers, as statistics, sometimes emblematic as humanity. This strategy is paralleled with an ongoing search for a visual language or definitive form of communication capable of transcending verbal dialectics. It’s about inventiveness and trigger points but it is also about impulses and emotions.”