Sue Dodd – Wendy Airhole

In a never before seen series of video works, Melbourne based artist Sue Dodd will
create a flamboyant POP diva – Wendy Airhole.

For the video works, Dodd has written all original songs, full of poignant and witty lyrics
that encapsulate the celebrity focused nature of popular culture today. Catchy and at
times cliché, Dodd’s songs cover all genres of pop music including country, surf, sixties
and rap.

Dodd’s fictional pop star, the dramatic Wendy Airhole, will be recorded performing the
songs which will be presented as a multi screen video installation. In the films, the over
the top and drag queen like Wendy questions the role of the artist and the fan, what it
means to follow a stylistic cliché, and the notion of living the dream.

Intended as a tribute, Wendy Airhole's name is derived from the derogatory nickname
given to Andy Warhol by the artists who hung out at Max's Kansas City, a hot spot for
New York’s musicians, poets, artists and politicians in the 70s. At Max’s, the serious
artists and critics used to gather in the front bar and discuss theory and ideas whilst
Warhol would saunter through to the back bar where he would party and pose. Dodd
has appropriated this nickname for her fictional pop star who certainly displays that she
knows how to party and to pose.

Throughout her long career, Dodd has developed an artistic practice that incorporates
performance, video and installation and responds to the contemporary cultural
landscape of globalisation, homogeneity and desire. Dodd looks at the playful and
expressive potentials of pop, mass media and celebrity culture through translation, overdubbing
and performance, challenging audience relationships to the work of art and
demonstrating possibilities for hybrid modes of production.