Re-use, collaboration and cultural activism from Indonesia

Image: Duto Hardono, Untitled (detail), 2006. Collage, acrylic, mixed media. Courtesy of the artist.

Currently showing at UTS gallery is an exhibition of artworks created from other people’s rubbish. Ranging from childlike drawings on discarded used envelopes to a life-size skull constructed from bent nails, SISA helps us consider waste, art and social impacts.

Sisa is the Indonesian word for ‘remains’ or ‘leftovers.’ Located somewhere between folk art, design, and public intervention, much of this work generates new forms of expression from the rejection of hyper-consumption and over-development.

This an exhibition of diverse pieces that would not be out of place in any museum exhibiting on sustainability, or the art activism boundary. I was moved by the complexity and effort that had gone into turning $0 scrap into intricate and often beautiful figures and images.

As a practitioner I often wonder why we don’t see more of this in galleries and museums – something that web 2.0 practitioners, Cath and others often write about here and other places. The social or self-made museum.

Pobblebonkless

Museum Victoria has won the McFarlane Prize for excellence in Australian web design for its lovely site Caught and coloured, about zoological drawings from colonial Victoria. Nice one – I love scientific art / arty science, and there is great contextual info – and stories – here too.

My only disappointment is that the audio for Pobblebonk / the Sand Frog is a human voice about the frog, ie, it doesn’t actually play the ‘pobblebonk’.

This Botanic Gardens page on frogs has audio recordings of various frogs, and it claims that when Eastern Banjo Frogs croak in unison, they make a sound like ‘pobblebonk’. Unfortunately (again!) the recording is of a solo performance.

I remain pobblebonkless.

Art swallows building in Paris

Indigenous Australian artists have been commissioned to embed artwork into the fabric of a new museum in Paris. Walls, ceilings and glass will contain – or be contained by – artworks. Artist Judy Watson has said it is as if the artists are “swallowing” the building. For more, see the Sydney Morning Herald report.

MAPDA education winners

The following entries received awards in the education category at the MAPDA presentation at the Queensland Art Gallery on Monday 17 May.

Level A
HC – Deakin University: Art for Arts Space
W – Manly Art Gallery & Museum: ‘Luminous’ Education Kit

Level B
HC – Ipswich Art Gallery: Super Chicken – Children’s Activity Booklet
W – Museum of Brisbane: The Legend of City Hall

Level C
HC – Queensland Art Gallery: Made for this World – Contemporary Art Kit
HC – Gallery of New South Wales: Exhibition Highlights
W – National Gallery of Victoria: ‘Dutch Masters’ Education Kit

MAPDA 06 education shortlist

The following institutions have been shortlisted for the educational material category of the Museums Australia Publications Design Awards (MAPDA) 06

Deakin University Museum
Ipswich Art Gallery
Manly Art Gallery
Museum of Brisbane
National Gallery of Victoria
Parramatta Heritage Centre
Queensland Art Gallery
The Art Gallery of New South Wales
Victorian Arts Centre Trust

Sydney Design 05

Sydney Design 05 has kicked off at the Powerhouse Museum and many other Sydney venues. On Saturday there was a market of young designers with well over 6000 shoppers through the door and over 40 stalls.

Wednesday night there will be a hypothetical discussing (arguing) the merits of urban design – centered on the establishment of a Guggenheim museum in Parramatta, NSW second city and the heart of Sydney.

PS – Cath how do you insert a hyperlink in the text?
PPS Cath – what is Praxis?