To caper is an unusual and entertaining activity; it is fool-hardy but, at its core, a conscious endeavour. It is to know the world and to act against simply knowing. CAPER is an exhibition showcasing artists from the RCA Painting program who enact conscious play in their practice.

The variety of creative output and the broadness of artistic approach is a testament to the possibility of abandoning expectations - allowing an impish or playful impulse to lead. Conscious play is a way to allow the unconventional to form or play out within the work. It is a method to find new creative possibilities and the unexpected in the conventional.

A common thread within the work is the multitude of forms the medium of paint can inhabit. This endeavour to play and seek through paint leans into the medium's qualities of fluidity. This medium fluidity can also be extended to conceptual fluidity - a misbehaving of what a painting can be or how it acts. Despite the frivolous or childish connotations of play, the artwork in this exhibition consciously engages with various social, political, and cultural networks. To approach creative practice as a free-spirited but self-aware act is to step aside from a knowingness or design, each artist engaging with contemporary discourse through encounter.