The second week of July brings NAIDOC week celebrating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and culture. This year’s theme, “We value the vision: Yirrkala Bark Petitions 1963,” commemorates the Yolgnu people’s missive to the Australian House of Representatives in which they protested mining in Arnhem Land and demanded recognition of the traditional owners and their land rights. There is an enormous range of activities across all states including the NAIDOC Awards, performances and screenings. Check the website for activities near you.
NAIDOC Week, national, 7-14 July http://www.naidoc.org.au/
For more on Yirrkala Bark Petitions see http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/bark-petitions-indigenous-art
courtesy of Gadigal Information Service
Trevor Dodds – Koori Radio 93.7FM Presenter
Extending the NAIDOC week spirit across the month Live and Deadly celebrates 20 years of the Gadigal Information Service in Redfern which also houses Koori Radio (93.7FM). Across July Carriageworks will host an exhibition of archives, photos, films and radio recordings documenting this vital and groundbreaking community organisation. There’s also live music including Klub Koori (July 4) and forums such as The Foundations of Koori Radio (July 4) and The Digital Future: Kooris in Space (July 25).
Live and Deadly, Carriageworks, 27 Jun-1 Aug; http://www.carriageworks.com.au/?page=Event&event=LIVE-AND-DEADLY
Purchased 2008, The Queensland Art Gallery Foundation Grant, collection: Queensland Art Gallery
Christian Thompson (Bidjarra/Kunja people)
Black Gum 2 (from ‘Australian Graffiti’ series) 2008
This exhibition offers the largest display of Indigenous art to date for QAG/GOMA featuring the work of 116 artists from across the country. Curated by Bruce McLean the 300 works on display are divided into three themes: My History, My Life, My Country. Artists include Vernon Ah Kee, Michael Riley, Brook Andrew, Judy Watson, Warwick Thornton, Destiny Deacon, Fiona Foley and Christian Thompson. There are also two site-specific commissions from Reko Rennie and Megan Cope, and Gordon Hookey has been commissioned to make Kangaroo Crew, a large-scale interactive work for the children’s centre. Accompanying the exhibition is a screening program at the cinematheque, My Life as I Live It: First Peoples and Black Cinema.
My Country, I Still Call Australia Home: Contemporary Art from Black Australia, Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art, 1 June-7 October; http://www.qagoma.qld.gov.au/exhibitions/current/my_country
photo Brad Serls
Decibel in the PICA Clock Tower
While PICA is undergoing some upheaval with urgent building repairs that have meant the postponement of the exhibition Improvised Sound Project, there’s still plenty going on. Decibel have been in residence with the Western Australian Composers Project presenting open rehearsals and honing their compositional methods and innovative score reading systems. The residency concludes with two concerts featuring works by Western Australian composers Christopher Tonkin, Rachael Dease, Sam Gillies, Johannes Luebbers, Henry Anderson and Decibel members Cat Hope, Lindsay Vickery and Stuart James.
The Western Australian Composers Project Concerts, PICA, 5 & 6 July, 6.30pm; http://www.pica.org.au/view/WA+Composers+Project+Residency/1664/
photo Jodie Hutchinson
(l-r) Yumi Umiumare, Holly Durant, Moira Finucane, Glory Bok…Paradise
Moira Finucane and Jackie Smith have been presenting bent burlesque for around 20 years, leading the way for the recent resurgence of interest in naughty cabaret. They will be presenting their annual winter showcase at 45 Downstairs over July with special international guests “dance siren” Holly Durant from Paris and red hanky stripper Ursula Martinez from London as well as the always captivating Yumi Umiumare and Circus Oz Ring Mistress Sarah Ward. The show will then tour to the Festival de Internacional de Buenos Aires in Argentina in October.
Finucane & Smith’s The Glory Box…Paradise, 45 Downstairs, Melbourne, 10 July -11 August; http://www.fortyfivedownstairs.com/events/
Bridie Connell, Free Fall performance 2012
Over nine days a three by three meter white cube at Artereal will be home to nine collaborative explorations. The resulting works will utilise a range of techniques from flower arranging to choreography and illustrate how “collaboration has moved into the mainstream of visual arts practice in the past decade” (press release). Artists include David Capra continuing his fetish for the Wizard of Oz here rendered in clay; brother and sister duo Michael and Karina Wikamto who will simultaneously make their family tree via computer generated images and sculptural collage; and Liam Benson working with Nic Atkins to create a pas-de-deux on masculinity.
Collaborateurs, artists Ella Barclay, Liam Benson, David Capra, Bridie Connell, Tully Arnot & Charles Dennington, Nola Diamantopoulos, Leahlani Johnson, Sylvia Schwenk, Michael & Karina Wikamto, Artereal, Rozelle, 3-11 July; http://artereal.com.au/home/collaborateurs
courtesy the artist
Daniel McKewen, Untitled (after Steven and John) (2013), single channel video installation
With Open Arms is an exhibition of video art reflecting the variety of ways young artists are manipulating the medium of video. Appropriated footage features strongly, for example Josephine Skinner has collected hundreds of YouTube clips of people singing “Hopelessly Devoted to You,” while Daniel McKewan explores abstraction via the filmic close-up. Antoinette J Citizen’s work takes a playfully subversive line as she attempts to cheat facial recognition software.
With Open Arms, curators Raymonda Rajkowski, Felicity Strong, also includes Tara Cook and Jonathon Nokes, Blindside, 10-13 July; http://www.blindside.org.au/2013/screen-series.shtml
This concert is a curatorial collaboration between vocalist Sonya Holowell and flautist Elia Bosshard who will be presenting “obscure classical music in an interdisciplinary landscape…with a ‘touch’ of theatrics” (website). The program includes works by Xenakis, Stockhausen, Schoenberg and Carl Vine juxtaposed with improvisations and dance for good measure.
Cache in Point, performers Elia Bosshard, Sonya Holowell, Ivan Cheng, Pat Keith, John Napier, Dean Kennedy, Jonathan Holowell, James McCaffrey, Liam O’Keefe, Red Rattler, Thursday, July 4, 7.30pm; https://www.facebook.com/events/575714642449943/?fref=ts
Christy Dena
Congratulations to sometime RealTime writer Christy Dena who has been awarded the inaugural QUT Digital Writing Residency. Her project, Robot University will explore the relationship between humans and robots and the development of ethics in this area. She will be collaborating with programmer Adam Single and sound composer Jacek Tuschewski utilising the game engine Unity to create an interactive narrative experience for viewers. The project is expected to be completed early 2014.
http://www.thecube.qut.edu.au/about/residency.php
Revelation Film Festival
various venues, Perth, 4-12 July
www.revelationfilmfest.org/
Show Off, Performance Space
till 17 July; Carriageworks
www.performancespace.com.au/2013/show-off-season/
Helium Season, Malthouse
8 June-5 Oct, see website for following productions
www.malthousetheatre.com.au/helium-2013/
Fright or Flight, 3 is a Crowd,
Judith Wright Centre, Brisbane, 6-13 July judithwrightcentre.com/event/fright_or_flight
Anne Ferran, Box of Birds
Stills Gallery, Sydney; 26 June to 27 July 2013
www.stillsgallery.com.au
Vocal Folds, Gertrude Contemporary
21 June-20 July; performances 11 July, 18 July
www.gertrude.org.au/exhibitions
RealTime issue #115 June-July 2013 pg. web