Acca Podcast

This panel discussion, hosted during ACCA's exhibition 'The Theatre is Lying: The inaugural Macfarlane Commissions' asked what is so intimidating about reality in a post-truth world? The panel, featuring Justin Clemens, Maddison Connaughton and André Dao, considered how our understandings of trust, truth, fiction and reality have changed in the age of fake-news, Trumpism and social media, from their positions as established thinkers, writers, storytellers and journalists. Recorded on Monday 4 March at ACCA. More information: https://acca.melbourne/exhibition/the-theatre-is-lying/

Sydney-based collaborators Anna Breckon and Nat Randall explore the intersection of live performance, video and film in a gallery context as they deep dive into the construction and development of their major new work 'Rear view' 2018 commissioned by ACCA and The Macfarlane Fund for ACCA's exhibition 'The Theatre is Lying' (15 December 2018–24 March 2019). Recorded at ACCA on Saturday 23 March 2019 More information: https://acca.melbourne/program/keynote-lecture-anna-breckon-and-nat-randall/ https://acca.melbourne/exhibition/the-theatre-is-lying/

How does being a teacher affect your art practice? How can an artist successfully engage with an institution’s collection? How do we create our own opportunities and categories? What does it mean to trust your gut? For this final episode of the second series, Tai Snaith and Meredith Turnbull discuss a broad range of topics around what it means to have a multifaceted, self-driven and supported practice. They share their love and importance of championing OTHER artists — what it means to not be a curator but to keep curatorial skills as part of your practice. Once again the notions of collapsing the boundaries between traditional notions of craft, ornament and art are highlighted and celebrated. Meredith praises the approachability of jewellery and the way it acts as a continuation of dialogue around ideas of genre, discipline and material values. Together they question what ‘achieving’ and ‘professionalism’ really mean. Finally, the importance of looking back, taking stock of our practices; recognising what

What roles can social politics and social media play in driving an art practice? What role do beauty and aesthetic boundaries play in art today? How can these things interrelate? Tai Snaith and Rowan Oliver delve down the rabbit hole of creating fictions around ideas and images of self and others, creating characters and narratives to open up ideas of social inclusiveness and empathy. Rowan outlines how we should keep making these fictions despite the despair around us. How does marketing affect our image of ourselves? What roles or characters do we play in social media? And what role do we play in the art world? Is it all a play? Rowan refreshingly discusses how she can foresee parts of her practice ‘shedding’ and talks frankly about choosing the path with the most flexibility of being open with herself. We also discuss Casting as a medium, playing the ‘art system game’ and her plans of moving into ‘Aquarian frequencies and taking down the government’. Additional resources: Rowan’s website: http://rowano

How important is it to connect with a place that is part of your history? What are your responsibilities to make work for ‘your people’ as well as an art audience? Tai Snaith and Megan Cope discuss what it means to move back to work ‘on country’ as a contemporary Indigenous artist. They unpack the complexities of relating to a place and its people, and how that might inform your work in a number of different ways. Megan talks about her involvement with proppaNOW and various travels from the bush to the city, overseas and now back to her father’s country on Quandamooka land. She sheds light on her passion for Middens and how they function in Indigenous culture, and their history as one of the earliest forms of architecture in the landscape. Additional resources: Middens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midden RE FORMATION at The National, Art Gallery of NSW: https://thisisnofantasy.com/exhibition/the-national-new-australian-art/ ‘Haunt’ at IMA Brisbane: https://ima.org.au/2019-program-announced/ Sovereignt

What does it mean to make artwork with a social consciousness? How do we represent our politics through what we wear? Tai Snaith and Kate Just discuss the way that clothes, like skin, can carry a multitude of meanings, stories and histories to make up who we are. Kate talks about using other artists’ clothes as the palette or starting point for constructing her current portraits. Our conversation outlines Kate’s very real motives for making change within the art institution to make it a more diverse and balanced community and the capacity that each of us have to work together to achieve change. Additional resources: Feminist Fan: http://www.katejust.com/feminist-fan/ Kate’s PhD project, The Texture of Her Skin: http://www.katejust.com/phd-texture-of-her-skin/ Catherine Opie: https://www.guggenheim.org/blogs/checklist/catherine-opie-denise-duhamel-and-the-stories-of-a-self-portrait Kate’s dream: https://www.instagram.com/p/BojWGCGlj0b/ Paris is Burning (1990): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Is_Burni

This event formed the public outcome of ACCA’s new writing program, Writing in the Expanded Field, alongside ACCA's exhibition Eva Rothschild: Kosmos (2018). In this public forum, writers, artists and performers who took part in the writing program, share results of the writing workshops and reflect on the future of art writing, criticism and publishing. Presented in partnership with RMIT University non/fictionLab and supported by Art+Australia, Art Guide Australia and The Lifted Brow, Writing in the Expanded Field explores new methodologies for art writing and criticism, opening writing to an ‘expanded field’ in which the encounter between writer and artwork, and the relations of this engagement, may be animated by various writing positions between the critical, the personal and the imaginary. Writing in the Expanded Field was developed in collaboration with Lucinda Strahan, writer and researcher at the RMIT non/fictionLab. More info: http://acca.melbourne/program/writing-in-the-expanded-field/ https://

In a few years time, there will be more dead people than living people on Facebook. This lecture by Professor Larissa Hjorth explores how social media affects how we think about life, death, afterlife and the everyday. Hjorth considers the role of social media in art practice to consider how emotional and social playbour is presenting new forms of digital intimate publics. Drawing on her research and recent book, Haunting Hands (with Katie Cumiskey 2017), which investigates practices of loss and trauma in, and around, mobile media, Hjorth discusses how loss and grieving on social media creates new ways of understanding the relationship between life, death and afterlife in everyday life. Distinguished Professor Larissa Hjorth is an artist, digital ethnographer and currently the Design & Creative Practice ECP Platform director at RMIT University. Hjorth has two decades experience working in cross-cultural, interdisciplinary, collaborative creative practice and socially innovative digital media research. Pre

How can we make traces of suffering into visual poetry? How do we map emotional data? Tai Snaith and Stanislava Pinchuk talk about the different ways we can make our art practice meaningful to our lives, and the lives of others. They discuss how Stan has managed to include travel, meeting people, tattooing and even beekeeping as integral parts of her practice. She explains her deeply thoughtful process of ‘data mapping’ and how it relates to her tattooing practice via shared modes of intimacy, trust, intensity and visual economy or minimalist language. We discuss the long-practiced traditions of making and wearing decorative motifs on the body and the utopian idea of exchanging honey and art and ideas in place of money. Additional resources: http://m-i-s-o.com/ https://www.forbes.com/profile/stanislava-pinchuk/#1a542922a073 https://chinaheights.com/exhibitions-/2018-borders-the-magnetic-fileds-stanislava-pinchuk-miso https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/feb/28/national-gallery-of-victoria-dum

How might an artwork be part of the language of interiors or functional design? How important is understanding scale and process? Tai Snaith and Esther Stewart go deep into process during this conversation. They discuss Esther’s studio process and what it means to adopt a more design-based practice and apply it to painting. Esther outlines the different stages of making a body of work from the ‘suitcase of patterns’ and ideas phase through to experimenting, ‘jiggled out thinking’, trialling, planning, making models and finally the labour or making stage. They unpack the notion of thresholds, taste, perspective and the uncomfortable but interesting problem of what happens when a visual artist’s work becomes part of the decor. Additional resources: 'How to Decorate a Dump' at Heide: https://www.heide.com.au/exhibitions/esther-stewart-how-decorate-dump Gertrude Contemporary: http://www.gertrude.org.au/studios/studios/current-22/esther-stewart.phps 'The world is waiting for the sunrise' at TCB: https://tcba

This discussion focuses on the intersection of form, space and movement in contemporary practice, alongside ACCA’s exhibition 'Eva Rothschild: Kosmos' (2018). Speakers include multidisciplinary practitioners working across art, architecture, design, choreography and theory. Together they will consider the social potential of sculpture, the idea of deceptive materiality, as well as the negotiation between colour, space, scale and disruption in relation to our experience of sculpture and acts of ‘hard looking’. Speakers: Jane Caught, architect and co-founder of multi-disciplinary collective, SIBLING Jo Lloyd, choreographer and dancer; and choreographer of CUTOUT in collaboration with Eva Rothschild at ACCA Simone Slee, artist and academic at the Victorian College of the Arts Fleur Watson, curator and editor specialising in architecture and design; and Executive Curator, Lyon Housemuseum, Melbourne More info: https://acca.melbourne/program/roundtable-form-space-movement/

How does architecture shape identity? How do artists, architects, power-brokers, nation-states, immigrants and insurgents make and mark territory? In this lecture, artist Eugenia Lim explores the space between the personal and the geopolitical, selfhood and sovereignty. Lim draws from her research, archives and experiences to navigate a subjective journey through architecture, earthworks and islands. Eugenia Lim is an Australian artist of Chinese–Singaporean descent who works across video, performance and installation. In her work, Lim transforms herself into invented fictional personas who traverse through time and cultures to explore how national identities and stereotypes cut, divide and bond our globalised world. Lim’s latest project 'The Australian Ugliness' surveys the role of architecture in marking a society and shaping national identity. The work has been titled after the bestselling book by Robin Boyd, arguably one of Australia’s most prominent architects and Modernists. Boyd’s The Australian Ugl

Gabrielle de Vietri is an Australian-based artist with a concept-driven, socially-engaged collaborative practice. Her work has taken the form of pedagogical systems, community events, interactive public performances, documents, invented languages, fictional historical insertions, lectures and gardens. In this lecture, Gabrielle de Vietri disobedience as a creative act through the theft of Picasso’s famous 'Weeping Woman' from the National Gallery of Victoria in 1986, by the Australian Cultural Terrorists who demanded better State funding for the arts. Presented by Abercrombie & Kent, ACCA’s 2018 lecture series, 'Uncommon knowledge: artists on their special interests' gives eight artists a microphone and an hour to speak about topics that inspire their art and thinking. Featuring a trans-generational cast of artists, Uncommon Knowledge brings together elements of history, lifestyle, philosophy, sound studies, sexuality, cultural politics and more, to challenge us to think differently about society and the wo

How important is it to make yourself and others visible? What can a photograph achieve, and what is the power of the photographer? Tai Snaith and Atong Atem discuss all the different aspects of Atong’s identity and how making sense of them informs her artwork. Atong explains what it is like to grow up ‘between cultures’ as a South Sudanese person in Australia and the liminality that exists as part of that. Atong openly addresses the complex nature of racism and the very real issue of ‘everyday racism’, often by ‘good’ people. With a practice that has always leaned towards portraiture and self-portraiture, this conversation with Atong very much revolves around ideas of the self, the power of the photographer, and power of accessing and owning your family history. Additional Resources: Atong’s website: https://www.atongatem.com/ Native Tongue by Mojo Juju: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLQ4by3lUJo https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/jul/17/turnbull-says-there-is-real-concern-about-sudanese-gan

Can we maintain a lightness of being using heavy materials? What is the role of a public artist and how is this changing? In this spirited conversation, Tai Snaith and Sanné Mestrom discuss what it means to be a self-made woman interested in the relationship between the lived world and the perceived world. They talk about depicting women with ‘gravity’ and a new way of how the female form might fit into the landscape. They discuss embarking on motherhood as an early to mid career artist and being okay with breastfeeding in the foundry, amongst many other things. Additional Resources: Sanné’s website: http://www.mestrom.org/ Les Demoiselles d’Avignon: https://www.moma.org/collection/works/79766 Prudence Flint: http://www.prudenceflint.com/ Architectural follies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folly Manifesto: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto_(2015_film)

What is Conceptual Art? How can we do away with Visual Litter? Tai Snaith and Agatha Gothe-Snape talk about the practice of deep thinking and the process of taking ideas apart. They discuss the fine balance of keeping all the parts of the ‘plait’ of one’s life even and neatly braided, and what it means to follow a series of decisions to consciously take away anything extraneous to create strong, clear work. Agatha talks about her ongoing desire to ‘cut through the conceptual fog with a sharp knife’ and even her lifelong goal to be a mascot for Puzzling World. Additional Resources: Mitch Cairns’ Archibald-winning portrait: https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/archibald/2017/29825/ Every Artist Remembered: https://agathagothesnape.net/every-artist-remembered-2017/every-artist-remembered-2017 Lawrence Weiner; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Weiner Puzzling World NZ: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puzzling_World

How can mockery and humour be used as a tool for survival? How do you write yourself into a history that has always favoured men? In this conversation Tai Snaith and Paola Balla go on a raucous storytelling romp through Paola’s vibrant past, recounting her ‘triple-whammy of Otherness’ as a young Wemba Wemba/Gunditjmara woman, with an Italian dad and a Chinese surname in Echuca/Moama in the '80s. Paola talks about the strong influence of indigenous women’s voices like Aunty Marge Tucker, and the links to the incredibly powerful artwork she continues to make around this to this day. Additional resources: https://www.facebook.com/WARcollective/ https://www.vic.gov.au/aboriginalvictoria/community-engagement/leadership-programs/aboriginal-honour-roll/2013-victorian-aboriginal-honour-roll/margaret-tucker-mbe-c.html http://www.fnawn.com.au/the-bennelong-letter-voice-of-a-wangal-diplomat/ https://www.djukimala.com/ https://www.naidoc.org.au/news/2018-national-naidoc-theme-announced https://www.naidoc.org.au/abo

Is a painting like a poem? How do we make our own rules when we are painting? In this conversation Tai Snaith and Laura Skerlj discuss their migrant roots in Australia and how this affects the ethics of how they live and work. Laura shares her secret practice of writing ‘tragic poems’ and how these are slowly creeping into her paintings. They share their love of double meanings and layering of possibilities in our palettes alongside other women painters they admire. Additional resources: http://lauraskerlj.com/ http://www.xavierhufkens.com/artists/lesley-vance http://www.anncraven.com/

How can we share an experience without using words? What is it like to feel the push and pull of presence and hiding? Tai Snaith and Archie Barry chat honestly about what role identity plays in Archie’s practice and how they are interested in expressing that identity in a non-visual way. They discuss the beautiful and sometimes frustrating ‘slipperiness’ of language and how cultivating the agency and capacity to connect with an audience can be a truly energising and grounding experience. Additional resources: https://archiebarry.com/tatsache/ https://archiebarry.com/hypnic/ https://www.discovervedanta.com/equation-you-are-that.htm

How can we make Culture rather than Art? Is the sky a black velvet blanket? Tai Snaith's podcast series returns with 13 more conversations with mid-career and emerging women and non-binary artists whom she admires. In episode one, Tai and Lucreccia Quintanilla discuss how having a punk attitude and how not necessarily wanting to fit in can be a good thing. Lucreccia talks about a process of finding ‘her people’ and then simply asking ‘what do we wanna do?’ as a way to begin making work. Together they share their love of the power of the dance floor and the mystery of the conch.  Additional resources: http://lucreccia-quintanilla.squarespace.com/ https://www.banffcentre.ca/programs/banff-artist-residence-summer-2018 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octavia_E._Butler https://acca.melbourne/explore/podcasts/a-world-of-ones-own/