Exhibition posters by Clare Wigney

The Church of Elwin Gracey - A Sermon on Gods, Idols and Fear

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“Transformation, which is the monster’s whole game, simultaneously altering their bodies
and changing the surrounding culture like radioactive fallout, is a mode of catharsis, along
with a strategy for abjuring a body that feels too vulnerable or out of control.... In certain
cases, the title ‘monster’ should be re-claimed in a spirit of punk triumph to become a great
honour. Monsters cause trouble, they disturb definitions, they discombobulate what we
think we mean. All of which is brave and wild, not to mention something like art’s task.”
– Charlie Fox

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Dearly beloved... as we gather here today... we celebrate the glory of Elwin Gracey.

Praise be to He! Elwin Gracey! For they are good and their love endures forever.

Here, your spiritual healer is your defence lawyer, your patron saint is your local pageant queen,
your rapture is nuclear destruction. I ask you – prepare to be healed by the divine, to undergo
psychic surgery and prime yourself to experience sanctification, as we receive signs of both literal
and spiritual salvation on earth.

Consider the art practice as a belief system, oh Lord, in The Church of Elwin Gracey, to hold
sacred faith in art – the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. To be made in God’s image – As the
artist and the viewer, the Lord and the believer, marry in focus, creating one image, they are
unified in belief.

Posters, signs, billboards, portraits, converge the image of God, Idols and Fear – Idols that
demand our devotion and Fear that floods.

Saints, beauty queens, rockstars, aliens, celebrity – muses to the greater glory of faith.

As we acknowledge fear of bad taste, of camp, of queerness, of punk, fear as the rapture, as
heartbreak, as the atomic bomb – to threaten established virtues, rebel against what is ordinary...
invert good and evil. Mysticism is magic, healing is magic, faith is magic and magic is the work of
the devil. Satan is real says those who believe. To believe in Satan you must believe in God. To
fear Satan you must fear God. Fear commands us, it is tyrannical.

In this house we banish the disrepute of bad taste. We honour it as a spectacle – it is instructive, it
is performative, it is subversive. !It is the farthest extension, in sensibility, of the metaphor of life as
theatre.” We undermine what really exists, illustrating the mystery in reality... Reality is a rumour,
after all.

Let us reflect... you came here as a strangers, you will now leave as family.
Your sacrifices have allowed you to be fruitful and abundant.
In Elwin’s name, we pray. Amen.

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Preacher Gabriella Lo Presti