Stressed about bushfires, endangered species, climate change, surveillance and state-sanctioned violence — and more mundane things like household grime, child safety, and you know, that whole mortality business.

These anxieties are a dark undertow to this year's Ramsay Art Prize, across 24 finalist works from Australian artists under the age of 40, brought together in an exhibition at the Art Gallery of South Australia that opened late May.

Canberra artist Anna Madeleine Raupach hand-stitched a map of the Gospers Mountain mega-blaze onto a silver emergency thermal blanket — the darkest colours representing where the most vegetation was lost.

West Australian farmer and artist Anna Louise Richardson wallpapered the gallery with everyday dangers of rural life — from snakes and spiders to household hazards like knives and powerboards.

Tasmanian artist Tom O'Hern presented a dense grid of 1,000 cartoon illustrations whose subjects ranged from the banal to the surreal to the catastrophic — laced with comedy and absurdity (and a lot of penises).

"I'm worried about a lot of things. And I guess humour is about saying serious things in a funny way," O'Hern said.

"But I'm kinda worried that the world's ending? That's a pretty bad one. And whether or not it will end is one thing — but I feel like we're in the process of it ending. And it would be nice if we got off that process.

"I wonder if people will look back at us and wonder why we weren't like [doing anything about it]."

At the same time, there was a celebratory mood at the Ramsay Art Prize media call on Friday: almost all the artists had flown in for the occasion, and the excitement was about more than who would walk away with the $100,000 prize.

The mere fact of being present in a gallery, to talk to other artists and about their own art, in the wake of a year of lockdowns and delays, was reason enough to feel happy — and perhaps hungrily so, given the spectre of further pandemic-related restrictions.

As it turned out, the winner of this year's Ramsay Art Prize neatly reflected the ambivalence of the moment.

In Kate Bohunnis's monumental installation Edges of Excess, a steel pendulum swings back and forth over a thick strap of soft pink silicone — a sight that was soothing to some, sinister to others, and both to many.

"It's somewhat alluring and transfixing but also holds the promise of injury — if something were to malfunction," the 30-year-old South Australian artist told ABC Adelaide's David Bevan.

"It's that sort of moment between function and dysfunction."

Inspired by her mother's use of pendulums as a divination tool for the family's decision-making, Bohunnis's work reflects on the adult legacy of a childhood ritual.

"I sort of realised that I was no longer able to make simple decisions or important decisions for myself and trust my word, and my knowledge and my gut entirely," she tells ABC Arts.

"And that was, I guess, the first practice of that, that I've seen — of handing too much over to something else — and then what that robs you of."

Thriving during COVID

The Ramsay exhibition is not purely angst, however.

Last year's lockdowns produced some incredible work, as artists survived — or even thrived — with smaller spaces, limited choices and fewer distractions.

Nathan Beard, based in Boorloo (Perth), used lockdown to expand his sculpture practice.

He delved deep into YouTube tutorials, learning how to make a hyper-realistic silicon version of his hands performing a gesture from traditional Thai dance — a familiar motif from his recent work.

Above | Julia Gutman made textile works in her room during lockdown, embroidering images of her friends onto items of clothing they donated.

Story By |  Dee Jefferson