back |
Bonita Ely, detail, DelugeDrown (2010) Ink jet print on rice paper, ink, silk, wood. 1400 cm L x 92 cm W image courtesy of the artist and AEAF |
environmental engagements
The Australian Experimental Art Foundation is about to open Three Rivers, a major survey of Bonita Ely’s environmental art. We’ve previously admired Ely's work in the MCA’s exhibition In the Balance and the Campbelltown Art Centre’s River Project (RT100). The exhibition includes the artist’s most recent work, The Murray’s Edge, which focuses on the river’s headwaters in the Mount Kosciusko National Park. When combined with her earlier work, the result is a complex and “compelling study of the Murray River from the 1970s until the present” (press release). If you can’t get to Adelaide, you can listen to Ely talk about her long-running engagement with the environment in an online video titled The Murray’s Darling. Bonita Ely, Three Rivers, Australian Experimental Art Foundation, April 8-May 5; www.aeaf.org.au
making and remaking the city
Still on the environmental theme, keep an eye out for The Right to the City, a symposium and exhibition happening in Sydney. The project takes its title from David Harvey’s article of the same name, in which he argues that the “freedom to make and remake our cities and ourselves is…one of the most precious yet neglected of our human rights” (press release). Curated by Lee Stickells and Zanny Begg (who reported on Tipping Point in RT100), the exhibition includes international artists such as Temporary Services (US), Atelier d'Architecture Autogérée (France), Marjetica Potrc (Slovenia), as well as locals Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro (RT92, RT57), Joni Taylor, SquatSpace and Milkcrate Urbanism. There is also a symposium on April 9, featuring a keynote lecture by Professor Margaret Crawford from the University of California, Berkeley. If you can’t be there, an exhibition catalogue is being published and selected symposium papers will be published in the Architectural Theory Review. The Right to the City, symposium April 9, exhibition April 8-30, TinSheds Gallery; www.therighttothecity.com
 |
The Waterloo Girls photo Karen Therese |
out and about
The practice of walking is one way of remaking the city that has become increasingly popular. So much so that there is now a Walking Artist’s Network where you can find artists who work with walking practices as well as a list of symposia and academic publications. Karen Therese's name might be added as she kicks off the Performance Space season of “walks, promenades, marches and strolls” with The Waterloo Girls. The piece “traverses though the lives and places of four generations of women who grew up in Waterloo” (website). Later in the year, there’ll be walks with Paschal Daantos Berry, Deborah Pollard and Anino Shadowplay Collective (Philippines); Jennifer Hamilton; Big Fag Press, Jo Holder and Fiona McDonald; Sarah Rodigari; Diana Smith; and Lily Hibberd. Quite apart from the walks, it’s good to see Performance Space getting out of CarriageWorks and getting about Sydney. The Waterloo Girls, part of Walk, Performance Space, April 7-9; www.performancespace.com.au
 |
Chrissy Norford, Benjamin Hancock, Eric Avery. Forseen photo Regis Lansac |
double dance
It’s only March but 2011 is already shaping up as a major year for contemporary dance in Australia: Dance Massive has just concluded; it’s Gideon Obarzanek’s last year at Chunky Move; Rafael Bonchela is consolidating himself at the Sydney Dance Company, extending his contract; there’s a new national secondary curriculum in dance to be written; and we’ve just launched our RealTime Dance portal, which includes all our dance articles back to 1994. In the meantime Dance Bites, from Western Sydney Dance Action and Riverside Theatre Parramatta, continues to gain momentum. Their latest show is a double bill by Frances Rings (RT98) and Narelle Benjamin. Rings’ Debris was commissioned by the West Australian Ballet and Benjamin’s The Dark Room was initially created for the Australian Ballet, so as it's likely you missed them the first time around now’s your chance. Forseen: Double Bill, April 6-9; www.riversideparramatta.com.au
 |
Applespiel, Tiny Stadiums photo courtesy of the artists |
spatial and relational art
We’ve only just recovered from the Imperial Panda festival (see Caroline Wake’s forthcoming review in the May 9 e-dition), but there’s another artist-produced festival on the horizon. Presented by PACT and curated by Quarterbred, the Tiny Stadiums Festival is now in its fourth year. This time round it presents a selection of projects that consider “art and its relationship to public space” with the chosen works spanning mediums including video, performance, live art, participation, installation and duration (press release). The artists include Applespiel (RT100), Beth Arnold, Lucas Ihlein (RT84), Jen Jamieson (RT87), Dan Koop (RT101), Bennett Miller, Nat Randall, Amy Spiers and Lara Thoms (RT76). Tiny Stadiums, PACT Centre for Emerging Artists, May 2-15; www.quarterbred.blogspot.com
 |
Yang Fudong, No Snow on the Broken Bridge, (still), 2006, 35mm film transferred to DVD, music by Jing Wang courtesy the artist and ShanghART Gallery, Shanghai, China |
no snow on broken bridge
The work of Yang Fudong has appeared in a number of exhibitions over the past year: first in the 17th Biennale of Sydney (RT97); then in Mu:Screen, Three Generations of Video Art at UTS (RT98) and also in The Big Bang at White Rabbit Gallery (RT98). Now, he has an exhibition all to himself at the Sherman Contemporary Art Foundation. The exhibition opens with No Snow on the Broken Bridge, a black and white multi-screen film that “explores the lives of the generation of young intellectuals who have grown up in a country hurtling toward modernisation” (press release). It also includes special screenings of Yang Fudong's seminal five-part film Seven Intellectuals in Bamboo Forest (2003-07). Yang Fudong, No Snow on Broken Bridge, Sherman Contemporary Art Foundation, March 18-June 4; www.sherman-scaf.org.au
RealTime issue #101 Feb-March 2011 pg. web
© RealTime ; for permission to reproduce apply to [email protected]
