Jay Ryves
For Terminus 2006 Ryves created a ficticious real-estate brochure for an imaginary residential proposal, SKY VILLAGE, involving her own perfected photographic landscapes in collaboration with architect, Peter Wise. This was mailed out to residences in Redfern and Waterloo, sites of extreme and perpetual development and renewal. The public response was canvased and documented, the appeal of these simulations providing an ironic option for a city obsessed with location, acquisition and possession.

Perfection assumes many guises in the photographs of Jay Ryves. Landscapes of unmistakable natural beauty provide the manicured backdrop for strange abodes, apparently just landed. The faint impossibility of these vistas is what makes them all the more alluring. Although founded in photorealism, these documents of nature and inhabitation seek to undermine their realist foundation.

Download SKY VILLAGE Brochure: Here

Comments welcome: Here

"I really liked your brochure - After I received it I spent a few minutes
deciding whether it was a real project. I find it interesting how determined we are to know whether something is real or not - Almost like the prospect of being tricked is so terrifying that we are willing to waste energy placing an idea in either a black or white category, regardless of whether it CAN be placed in one or the other. This minor quest was so distracting for me that I forgot to read it properly and actually see and enjoy the images (which are very nice by the way), until later.

Most of the residents in my development (Victoria Park), speak little
english and take no part in their local community. They don't seem to care
what building goes up where and what impact it may have on their
immediate or future environment. For this reason, I would be interested
in their response to such an absurd and illogical project as this! Maybe
it will make them finally contemplate larger societal issues and start to
form an opinion on the current path of development in Sydney, and the
sort of place they want to live in. I hope this is so.

Please keep questioning and confronting us!"
Alyssa Ng

Sky Village, 2006 © the artist and Terminus Projects

Untitled, 2006 © Jay Ryves

Sky Village , 2006 © the artist and Terminus Projects


Untitled, 2006 © Jay Ryves