Visual artists – Gallery Review Europe

Now or Never’s 2024 arts program is a spectacle of interactive installations, audio-visual feasts and experimental dance

J.Andrew — Mon, 05 Aug 2024 23:39:10 +0000

No one does transcendental art performances quite like Now or Never. Better yet, a lot of the arts events are free to attend. Read on to find out more about some of the other-worldly performances that are taking over this city in August.

Now or Never’s 2024 festival

Boundary-pushing digital arts festival Now or Never will take over Melbourne’s CBD
It will run from Thursday 22 to Saturday 31 August
Tickets are on sale now. To explore the full program, head here

Keep up with the latest music news, features, festivals, interviews and reviews here.

Constellations

Thursday 22 August to Saturday 24 August, 6pm to 11pm
Sunday 25 August, 6pm to 10pm
Thursday 29 August to Saturday 31 August, 6pm to 11pm
Southbank Promenade
More info here

A very special takeover of the Yarra River/Birrrarung, Constellations promises the spectacular. Free to attend, this celestial formation by Studio Lemercier is an audiovisual installation that will see the surface of the river come alive after dark as it envisages the ever-expanding supernatural scope of the universe, right here in Naarm.

DESASTRES

Friday 30 August to Saturday 31 August, 4pm to 10pm
NantStudios, Docklands
Tickets here

After premiering at the 2022 Venice Biennale, DESATRES is making its hotly anticipated Australian debut as part of Now or Never’s Melbourne program. A visceral noise-guitar work of experimentation, Marco Fusinato’s performance will consist of an improvised electronic guitar piece that brings alive imagery spanning across the world’s biggest LED volume screen.

kajoo yannaga

Thursday 22 August to Sunday 25 August, 10am to 9pm
Monday 26 August to Saturday 31 August, 10am to 5pm
ACMI, Swinburne Studio
More info here

kajoo yannaga, or come on let’s walk together, by Wiradjuri-Scottish artist April Phillips, is a visceral reimagination of a virtual walk on Country, led by the Companion Sky Spirit. A technological feat that combines First Nations knowledges with real-time motion tracking that maps body movement, this free immersive two-channel projection is an innovative and thoughtful digital exploration of our place on Country.

Plagiary

Wednesday 28 August to Friday 30 August, 7.30pm to 8.30pm
Saturday 31 August, 2pm to 3pm, 7.30pm to 8.30pm
Arts Centre Melbourne, Fairfax Studio
Tickets here

AI is the director and you are its willing audience in this innovative experimental dance performance by dance technologist and choreographer Alisdair Macindoe. Choregraphed by artificial intelligence, Plagiary is an algorithmically directed dance piece that explores questions surrounding AI’s role in artistic creation.

Present Shock II

Thursday 22 August to Sunday 1 September
Melbourne Town Hall, Forecourt
More info here

Created by United Visual Artists in collaboration with Massive Attack’s Robert Del Naja, Present Shock II is the kind of art piece that once you see it, you’ll want to visit it again, and again and again. Consisting of a wall of statistical clocks and live news feeds in a glass box outside the Town Hall, this installation is both free and open all day, every day over the course of the festival.

Silent Symphony

Thursday 22 August, 7pm to 10pm
Friday 23 August to Saturday 24 August, 12pm to 10pm
Sunday 25 August, 12pm to 8pm
Melbourne Town Hall, Main Hall
More info here

A sonic exploration of the universe and its musical capabilities, Silent Symphony is a free art installation by United Visual Artists that experiments with the idea of musica universalis – that the universe produces an inaudible type of music. The eight sculptural pieces rotate in formations that never repeat, meaning that your experience of the work will be different every time.

Slow Walker

Thursday 22 August to Saturday 31 August
Melbourne Museum, Plaza
More info here

A collision of art, performance, music and AI, Slow Walker is the experimental brainchild of writer and director Peder Bjurman. Accompanied by a soundtrack designed by Abdul Mogard and with AI-generated narration underscoring the imagery, Slow Walker reimagines the microscopic organisms tardigrades, as colossal beasts that float over our city.

SOFT CENTRE / SUPERMODEL

Saturday 31 August, 10pm until late
State Library Victoria
Tickets here

Eora-based art collective SOFT CENTRE is bringing the heat to Naarm with a three-day debut at Now or Never that covers everything from late night music to workshops to deep-dive discourses. For a very special night at the State Library, they’ll be taking over the reading rooms and bookshelves for a late night extravaganza of performances and live art pieces.

Check out the full Now or Never program here.

Beat is an official media partner of Now or Never.

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Cancer-stricken Pinay visual artist in UAE gets outpouring of support

J.Andrew — Mon, 05 Aug 2024 23:31:43 +0000

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — It takes a village to raise a child. Or help the cancer-stricken survive.

Such has been the story of 48-year-old Jeanelyn Jarder, who after being diagnosed with breast cancer two years ago, received an outpouring of support from friends and strangers alike to help her get through her darkest hour.

“I am lucky to be a product of our Bayanihan spirit, where our friends helped us. People from different communities came together to ensure that I finish my six chemotherapy sessions. Our peers did not abandon us. Good karma, I must say,” said Jarder, who holds a degree in interior designing from La Consolacion College – Bacolod, and is a celebrated visual artist here.

Support came in various ways – from random acts, to offers of footing the bill on some of the expenses. Hot meal that Jarder prepared and sold to help raise money, spread around, bought by her friends and then her friends’ friends and finally, by strangers.

Jarder recalled a moment when she was selling some of her house plants, and people of different nationalities showed up to buy, including a lady from India, who offered to pay for a session of her radiotherapy.

“She said, ‘Go and have one more session. The next days, God will provide,’” Jarder shared. She said she was actually planning to stop going for treatment back then to avoid incurring more debts.

These days, Jarder is into a start-up food business with support from friends who helped do the paperwork and secure permits. She said she keeps herself busy, even when undergoing treatment, as long as her body would allow her.

“I easily get tired sometimes, especially during the treatment stages. There were times I couldn’t do anything because I was not feeling well. There were instances too, when I didn’t have an appetite to eat. But I always try to eat well, else I’d lose strength. I also always make sure to set my mind in the highest spirit every day,” Jarder said.

Treatments, therapies

In all, Jarder has gone through six chemotherapy sessions done every three weeks, followed by 33 sessions of radiotherapy and two surgeries, the second done after doctors learned that the cancer started growing again. This month, Jarder will undergo a PET scan to determine if she still has cancer.

According to Jarder, the chemo sessions and tests, including biopsy, cost approximately AED70,000. The 33 radiotherapy treatments cost more than AED92,000 shouldered in part by Friends of Cancer Patients (FOCP), a civic group. Jarder and her husband still owe Advance Care Oncology Center, from where she had the treatments, AED25,000.

To help raise money, Jarder said plans are afoot to hold a fundraiser and sell her artworks. “Hopefully, by the end of the year,” she said.

To help raise money, Jarder says plans are afoot to hold a fundraiser and sell her artworks. Contributed photo

Tough ride

Looking back, Jarder said it has been a tough ride with no end in sight as of yet. Her ordeal began in August of 2022, when she noticed a mass on the left side of her breast and mistook it for muscle sprain. A month later, she noticed that the mass has grown bigger. The cancer was confirmed in October, following medical tests.

“It was only then that things slowly sank in – I have it,” Jarder said.

She said she didn’t bother asking what stage of cancer it was. “It’s much easier to handle that I know I have (cancer) no matter what stage. But I learned I have a grade 3 tumor ductal carcinoma,” Jarder said.

A grade 3 tumor ductal carcinoma is the most aggressive type and more likely to spread and grow faster, according to oncologists.

Dr. Mohanad Diab, renowned consultant in the field of oncology to whom Jarder was referred, recommended that she commence chemotherapy.

“The doctors who were with me in this journey were very kind,” said Jarder.

Aside from Dr. Diab, two other specialists helped Jarder – Dr. Riyad Bendardaf, professor and senior consultant of medical oncology at University Hospital Sharjah (UHS); and Dr. TareK Ibrahim Mahdi, surgeon, also at UHS.

Worst time

Jarder said it was the worst time for her to be diagnosed with breast cancer.

“It was a very challenging moment for us since we were in a deep financial (bind). My insurance has expired and we could not afford to renew it due to its premium.

“Bills were piling up. We were paying upfront for all the laboratory tests. We realized we were slowly getting drained. I started applying for charities, trying to seek help and find directions,” Jarder said.

Jarder has stopped working for the past nine years prior to the diagnosis, tending to her visual artworks, her passion, while spending time on community activities and with charitable groups.

Her husband has resigned in the same year she was diagnosed and started a small business instead.

“We were forced to (leave) our house (and move elsewhere) so we could work on a certain budget. We lost our car. We gave away our stuff. We moved from one place to another,” Jarder said. The couple settled in Sharjah, where rents were relatively cheaper.

“I kept telling herself, ‘It’s not the end of the world.’”

Jarder said relatives in Philippines know about her medical condition, “but I don’t bother them because everyone already has their own responsibilities.”

Not yet cancer-free

Jarder said that while she is still not cancer-free yet, her journey has taught her to “accept things wholeheartedly and embrace the changes happening to my body.”

“Cancer is not killing me after all,” she said. On the contrary, she added, “it is helping me become a better person.”

Jarder started advocating breast cancer awareness last year. “I am always happy to give back to the community,” she said. —KBK, GMA Integrated News

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Exhibition Callout – Zig Zag Gallery 2025 Program Opportunities – ArtsHub Australia

J.Andrew — Mon, 05 Aug 2024 22:57:57 +0000

The City of Kalamunda is delighted to announce that we are open for exhibition proposals for those who wish to be part of the Zig Zag Gallery 2025 program!

The Zig Zag Gallery seeks to encourage creative exploration, support connections to local cultural activities, and host meaningful and innovative creative experiences that provoke deeper connections to community and creative work. We invite applications from artists, art groups, and curators of any age who are at any stage of their career, whether established, mid-career and/or emerging. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders and people from diverse cultural backgrounds are encouraged to apply.

If you have any questions or require help applying, please contact the Zig Zag Art Gallery Curator at zzgallery@kalamunda.wa.gov.au

Applications close: Sunday 18th August 2024 at 1159pm AWST.

Photo credit: Danica Zuks and Ria (Curated St)

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4 Visual Artists Awarded Free Studio Space in ARTS DISTRICT Liberty Station Through Emerging Artist Program

J.Andrew — Mon, 05 Aug 2024 19:35:52 +0000

Photo via Pexels.com

NTC Foundation, the non-profit organization that oversees the development of 26 buildings in ARTS DISTRICT Liberty Station, named the next four visual artists selected as part of their Emerging Artist program.

After receiving numerous submissions for the program, the NTC Foundation has awarded four talented artists, from unique and diverse backgrounds, free studio space in Barracks 14. Gracie Moon and Sean Sarmiento will occupy the Emerging Artists studio through December and Amanda DiGiovanni and Helena Westra will take over the studio from January 2025 through June 2025.

Each occupying a 6-month term, the four visual artists will get the chance to explore their creativity and enhance their skills in one of San Diego’s most vibrant hubs for arts and culture. They will use this opportunity to build their career, engage with other artists, and grow their audience and patron base for future success.

“The NTC Foundation is always excited to uplift emerging artists in a way that stimulates creativity, sparks imagination, and hones their skills within such a dynamic community like ARTS DISTRICT Liberty Station,” said Lisa Johnson, president and CEO of the NTC Foundation. “Through the Emerging Artist program, we are able to give the next wave of emerging talent in San Diego the platform to hone their skillsets by providing them with studio space. We are so excited to see what these four visual artists will achieve in the next year.”

More information on each of this year’s recipients is included below:

July 2024 – December 2024 Artists

Gracie Moon

As a Japanese American artist, Gracie Moon explores themes of racial and cultural intersectionality through her sculptural and performative work. She is currently developing a new body of work that integrates ceramics, performance and sculpture, utilizing materials such as food, found objects, and both industrial and domestic items to create visual poetry. These stories navigate the tension of the in-between spaces where the complexities of her multicultural identity are examined. Gracie eagerly anticipates the creative collaboration opportunities in ARTS DISTRICT and is excited to collaborate with the dance and ceramic centers within ARTS DISTRICT.

Sean Sarmiento

Prior to his debut residency in ARTS DISTRICT Liberty Station, Sean Sarmiento has showcased his captivating work throughout Southern California. As a photo-based artist, he manipulates architectural and photographic norms to challenge traditional perceptions of photography and two-dimensionality. Sean has exhibited his work at the Athenaeum Museum in La Jolla, Palos Verdes Art Center, and the Student Life Pavilion and Metro Building at the University of San Diego, among others. His imagery often explores themes of home, capturing his own body in domestic settings to evoke feelings of being in between, moments that are both unknown and familiar. Sean is excited to immerse himself in his practice in new and innovative ways in ARTS DISTRICT.

January 2025 – June 2025 Artists

Amanda DiGiovanni
Born and raised in San Diego, local artist Amanda DiGiovanni has always been captivated by the dynamic nature of multimedia art and its ability to transcend boundaries. Her creative journey began at a young age, experimenting with various techniques and mediums, leading her to continue her artistic pursuits. Through her work in sculpture, performance, and photography, Amanda evokes profound reflections on human existence. Eager to expand her creative horizons, she looks forward to growing as an artist during her residency at ARTS DISTRICT Liberty Station.

Helena Westra
Based in San Diego, Helena Westra is a multifaceted artist specializing in sculpture, ceramics, performance, and land art. Utilizing a diverse range of accessible and often locally harvested materials such as clay, dirt, and found objects, her work serves as a meditation on introspection, release, and grounding. Helena delves into the realms of symbology and archetypes, employing themes of flora and fauna to forge a deep connection between the land and the environment. She is excited to explore new spaces, experiment with innovative mediums, and be in a generative headspace in ARTS DISTRICT.

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Artists are attacked in São Paulo during wall painting in

J.Andrew — Mon, 05 Aug 2024 19:00:48 +0000

Artists taking part in the painting of the lateral part of a building on Consolação Street, São Paulo, suffered what they describe as a “Zionist attack” on Sunday afternoon (4). According to them, a man approached the artwork – an almost 30-meter mural in homage to the Palestinian people – kicked ink cans, assaulted the team on the ground and even touched the ropes holding visual artist Kleber Pagu at the top of the wall.

The activity is part of the National Day of Muralism in defense of Palestine, organized by the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST, in Portuguese) in different Brazilian cities. The building that houses the mural is the same where the Occupation Penha Pietra is, which is also part of the scheduled political activities.

“What happened was an act of intolerance, a Zionist attack targeting an artist. But the most serious thing is that a person was hanging from ropes and the attacker pulled those ropes. In other words, there was an attack on the artist’s life,” said Luciano Carvalho, the coordinator of MST’s National Day.

The case was referred to the 78th Police District, in the Jardins neighborhood, where a police report was filed. However, at the time of writing, Brasil de Fato had not received a response from the police on the matter.

Visual artist Kleber Pagu, who suffered the most serious aggression, comments that “at other times there were insults, cars honking, but there’s a huge difference when someone comes up to you and attacks you. Another line has been crossed,” he says.

An inauguration of the work was scheduled for 2 p.m. on Sunday (4). After the attack, however, the afternoon schedule was changed to a protest against the violence the group suffered. “We’re going to finish the work and hold a political event. But we’re going to need popular security guards to deal with this state of violence,” said Luciano Carvalho.

Edited by: Nathallia Fonseca

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2024 Queensland Regional Art Awards Opportunities – ArtsHub Australia

J.Andrew — Mon, 05 Aug 2024 05:36:01 +0000

2024 Queensland Regional Art Awards

The highly anticipated Queensland Regional Art Awards (QRAAs) are Flying Arts Alliance’s annual visual arts awards for established and emerging artists living in regional Queensland. Offering Australia’s largest regional art awards prize pool of over $140,000, the QRAAs are one of Australia’s pre-eminent awards. Finalists are exhibited in Brisbane with the winning and highly commended artworks announced at a gala reception.

The theme for the 2024 QRAA is Resolution. Artists and society as a whole grapple and confront multiple viewpoints and concepts requiring resolution. Through the creative process, artists take this voyage through differing personal and social lenses to reach a meaningful resolution in their work. This reflects and is relevant to the broader journey of society.

Call for Entries

The prestigious 2024 QRAA are now open to artists from across Queensland living outside the Brisbane City Council boundary. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to share in Australia’s largest regional art awards prize pool.

Click Here to Enter

Key Dates

19 August, 4pm AEST – Entries open

7 October, 4pm AEST – Entries close

7-15 December- Finalists exhibited at Judith Wright Arts Centre

7 December- Winners Announced at Gala Reception

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Catapult + Adelaide Fringe Mentorship Opportunity Opportunities – ArtsHub Australia

J.Andrew — Mon, 05 Aug 2024 01:15:20 +0000

Generously supported by the James and Diana Ramsay Foundation, the Catapult + Adelaide Fringe mentorship will provide a funded opportunity for a South Australian visual artist, craftsperson or designer to undertake a 6-month mentorship with a chosen mentor, culminating in a public program, presentation of new work or performance as part of the 2025 Adelaide Fringe.

The Catapult + Adelaide Fringe mentorship program aims to enrich the artist’s professional and creative development through dedicated time spent with an aspirational mentor.

The successful mentorship will receive $7,500:

Mentee/mentor fees (including superannuation) of $5,000
Presentation fees (including registration fee and venue hire) of $2,500

The mentorship outcome can take the form of public programming, presentation of new work or performance during the 2025 Adelaide Fringe program, to be negotiated with the recipient. Adelaide Fringe will support the identification of a suitable venue location.

Catapult + Adelaide Fringe is presented in partnership by Guildhouse and Adelaide Fringe with generous support from the James and Diana Ramsay Foundation.

CLOSING MONDAY 26 AUGUST 9AM ACST

MORE INFORMATION AND TO APPLY: https://guildhouse.org.au/call-out-catapult-adelaide-fringe/

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United Visual Artist founder Matt Clark

J.Andrew — Fri, 02 Aug 2024 14:00:00 +0000

Matt Clark puzzles over the definition of art as a simple encounter with a painting. The founder of United Visual Artists is drawn, instead, to the way disciplines bleed into each other. How different environments can conjure different selves. In the mid ’90s, Clark came across the work of Bill Viola. The great video artist, who died last month, made installations that fused together sound, light and moving image. He famously believed that technology – a force that disrupts and fragments and divides – could help us better understand the mysteries of human consciousness.

“I saw the Bill Viola show at the Whitechapel and the first work was Nantes Triptych,” Clark tells me. “It presented his mother dying, his wife giving birth to a child and him in the middle and it knocked me for six, it was so profound. As I walked through the exhibition, it felt like one work blended into the next and became this experience that you navigated.” He pauses. “I have always been interested in mediums that are inherently emotive and touch on the transient nature of existence. For me, art should be about transcendence.”

Viola’s work poses questions: Why are we here? What do we owe each other? How do we override the terror of contemporary life to find joy or awe or wonder?

When Clark started out 20 years ago, promoting events, designing records and concerts and books, these concerns had started to simmer under the surface of the culture. They reared up with an intensity unimaginable at the turn of the millennium – that strange period marked by dial-up modems and around-the-clock news channels and the early tendrils of mass surveillance, levelled first at bodies stigmatised by 9/11.

“What we wouldn’t do to have those problems,” Clark says.

At the moment, he’s reading The Coming Wave, the new book by Mustafa Suleyman in which the tech entrepreneur issues a warning about the speed with which artificial intelligence is remaking society. “Things are moving in so many different directions,” Clark says. “There is not even a left or right or up and down anymore. I can’t quite understand the gravity of this new era we are part of.”

Clark appears on my screen over Zoom wearing a black baseball cap and wire-rimmed glasses. He moves between a boyish, streetwise energy and a kinetic curiosity. He takes time to gather his thoughts. He articulates knotty ideas plainly. Sometimes, he looks away from his computer, as if searching for what flickers in his mind, his attention rippling outward.

This month, United Visual Artists (UVA) will present two installations at Now or Never, a new festival spanning art, sound and technology that will unfold over 17 days across Melbourne, featuring work by the likes of Studio Lemercier and Marco Fusinato. He sends me videos over email and in one, Silent Symphony, eight sculptures revolve in an otherwise empty room, emitting planes of light, their movements growing increasingly animated, frenetic, attuned to an invisible frequency. In the other, Present Shock II, row after row of statistical clocks, in alarm-bell red, flit across a screen that recalls a stock exchange ticker display. The digits appear and disappear only to emerge again in new configurations. They are interspersed with headlines – Images of Trump and Kanye dancing around golden showers, Global snail market value this year – generated via algorithm and plucked from the news, an illusion of authority masquerading as evidence.

“There is so much promise and so much danger,” Clark says. “We’ve had fake news since medieval times but it’s the abundance [of it]. The work is as much about that as it is about the speed of information that we are navigating on a daily basis.”

In 2008, the cultural anthropologist Michael Wesch first used the phrase “context collapse” to describe the sensation of different audiences converging on digital platforms, sparking a form of dialogue that flattens meaning, divorces a message from its origin. To view Present Shock II is to be knocked sideways, unmoored from time and space, stuck in a perpetual “now”, deprived of the ability to discern fact from truth, past from present. It invokes this moment so precisely, I’m almost reassured: maybe my distress isn’t a personal failing but the logical consequence of being cast out of language, of no longer inhabiting a reality with borders that we can agree on.

Present Shock II, which will be presented in a glass box outside Melbourne Town Hall, unfolds to a plaintive score by long-time collaborator, Massive Attack’s Robert Del Naja, himself a renowned visual artist. Clark has thought about this work since he first designed visuals for the 100th Window tour of the trip-hop pioneers, alongside engineer Chris Bird and programmer Ash Nehru, who would go on to become UVA’s founding members.

“We wanted the band to communicate their political concerns,” he says. “It was a form of social media before social media and smartphones. It was 2003 and we were living through the start of the Information Age. We were feeling anxious then. How can you believe anything? It was really about trying to make a snapshot of ‘now’, a barrage that left the audience engaged but also overwhelmed at what they experienced.”

Present Shock II, which premiered last year at London’s 180 Studios as part of Synchronicity, UVA’s 20th anniversary exhibition, represents questions that Clark has been grappling with for two decades, and which have only grown more prescient.

“I wanted to visit some of the ideas that existed in fragmented form in that first show,” he says. “Who would have imagined the world we were going to go into in 20 years, with AI, with automation? It’s hard to believe that things could [become] worse.”

UVA has presented works around the world – from Seoul to Shanghai, Hobart to Barcelona. Clark confesses, with a sheepish laugh, that he has spent his entire life in the same pocket of south-east London. His mother, he says, was a hairdresser; his father, a publican.

“I grew up within a supportive working-class family, but really struggled with my education,” he says. “I had undiagnosed ADHD and dyslexia, so I wasn’t very academic, but had a strong thirst for learning.”

As a teenager, he gravitated towards hip-hop: Public Enemy and N.W.A, alongside electronic music from the 1980s. At school, he could paint. He could draw. He was nurtured by his art teacher.

“I applied to go to Camberwell College and studied a joint honours course,” he says. “You spent half the time learning a design discipline and the other in fine arts. I chose sculpture. I really loved the three-dimensional world of making things. [In my family] just to be a professional in the visual arts and make a living from that seems a ridiculous proposition. But I had no other choice and I’m extremely grateful.”

After college – “because I needed to eat” – Clark became a graphic designer. A long-time music fan, he started working with sonography. A production manager whom he had met while designing a show for the electronic duo Leftfield introduced him to Del Naja. “Massive Attack were the soundtrack to my youth,” he says. “I knew they had worked with these amazing directors and photographers – Nick Knight and Michel Gondry. I knew if we approached it the right way, it could be a springboard to setting up our own art studio.”

In a world obsessed with words like “immersive”, it’s become common for artists to collaborate with technologists, but this was new terrain when Clark, Nehru and Bird began. “We named ourselves United Visual Artists,” laughs Clark, whose co-founders have since moved on to other projects. “Although we were three guys in a little studio in Brixton, it was [as if] we were a big enterprise.”

They started collaborating with some of the best-known musicians in the world: U2, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jay-Z. Still, there was something missing. “They were huge productions in terms of scale,” he says. “But we became curious about ideas that weren’t in service to other artists.”

Then, in 2006, the Victoria and Albert Museum invited UVA to present an installation in the John Madejski Garden, a courtyard enclosed by 19th century Italianate architecture. Volume, a field of 48 columns that emitted sound in response to movement, reflected the questions that would go on to define the collective: where is the line between artwork and spectator? Are our actions the result of our desires or the rules that govern the spaces we occupy? In the work, lozenges of light turn pink, then green. Orbs hover in the dark, between ground and air. The work shapes and reshapes itself around viewers’ bodies.

“I was interested in ritualistic spaces and anthropological studies,” says Clark, whose 2014 installation Momentum turned the Barbican’s Curve Gallery into a spatial instrument. “[Imagine] that you had told yourself just 10 years ago that people would be looking at a concert through a screen, holding their hands above their heads. It was about how certain parameters can change human behaviour in quite an extreme way.”

In the Information Age, of course, we’re all performers. These times have granted anyone with a smartphone access to an audience, the power to narrate themselves. But Clark is equally interested in the shape of what we fail to listen to. “I went on a trip to the Arctic and remember getting off the boat,” he says. “There was no wind, no trees. The silence was scary and loud.”

For The Great Animal Orchestra – an acclaimed collaboration with Bernie Krause, the bio-acoustician and artist who introduced the synthesiser to popular music – UVA designed spectrograms for field recordings of animals in their natural habitat. Krause had been collecting the recordings for 45 years. Encountering the work at the Biennale of Sydney two years ago, I struggled at first with sensory overload. The beams of light that encircle the black space. The chorus of croaks and growls and hums that escalate to a heightened pitch. When I learnt that 70 per cent of these species no longer existed, the work started to feel elegiac and, suddenly, I could enter it.

“Not only does Bernie understand that sound comes from animals, but music emerges from all sorts of [sources],” says Clark, who has also collaborated with the neurobiologist Mark Changizi and the choreographer Benjamin Millepied. “A sound passing through reeds can be activated by a person over time into music. There are so many perspectives of where music has evolved from but also what sound can tell us.” He stops for a moment to reflect on this. “If you use your eyes, you could look at a habitat and it might look fine.”

To make Silent Symphony, a collaboration with Icelandic–Australian composer Ben Frost that was originally commissioned for Dark Mofo, Clark turned to the cosmos. He tells me Pythagoras, the Greek philosopher best known for his theorems, once believed the universe produced rhythms that were inaudible, to which mortals weren’t attuned.

“It isn’t true – [the universe] is very chaotic,” says Clark, who will show the work in a circular formation at Melbourne Town Hall. “But through NASA, we found this group of dwarf planets that oscillate and orbit around the sun and create these really interesting harmonic patterns. It’s the kind of work that pulls you in, seduces you into this safe, meditative space. But at times it becomes frightening.”

For Clark, Silent Symphony reimagines celestial patterns as sculpture. Like all his work, though, it aims to grapple with the forces that jockey for our attention by drawing us beyond the realm of the perceptible.

“I have neurodivergent challenges and have a personal desire to create spaces in which you are not distracted by anything but the present,” he smiles. “In the back of my mind, if people are willing to stay in a space and contemplate what’s going on, to me that’s the sign of a successful artwork.”

This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on
August 3, 2024 as “Kinetic curiosity”.

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Visual artists hold rally in support of quota reform movement

J.Andrew — Thu, 01 Aug 2024 17:37:30 +0000

Although the rally was scheduled to take place in front of the Parliament building, the protesting artists had to change the location to Ananda Cinema Hall premises as there was another programme going on at Manik Mia Avenue.

TBS Report

01 August, 2024, 02:25 pm

Last modified: 01 August, 2024, 03:00 pm

Visual artists of the country staged a protest rally today (1 August) supporting the 9-point demand put forward by quota reform protesters.

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Visual artists of the country staged a protest rally today (1 August) supporting the 9-point demand put forward by quota reform protesters.

Visual artists of the country have staged a protest rally supporting the nine-points of the quota reform protesters at the capital’s Farmgate intersection today (1 August).

Although the rally was scheduled to take place in front of the Parliament building, the protesting artists had to change the location to Ananda Cinema Hall premises as there was another programme going on at Manik Mia Avenue.

During the rally, the artists were seen chanting slogans, including “We want a fair Bangladesh, which has human dignity and is free from fear” and “Bring justice to the killings, stop murder-violence-harassment-mass arrests”.

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When asked about the purpose of their protest, the artists said, “We’ve gathered here to demand justice for the killings, put an end to arrests and shooting, and demand the release of the detained students. The government has to take steps immediately to stop harassment of the students and end the ongoing violence.”

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List of remaining 2024 metro Detroit summer art festivals

J.Andrew — Thu, 01 Aug 2024 17:14:51 +0000

As summer and fall art fairs in metro Detroit continue to provide delightful outdoor and cultural experiences, the Belle Isle Art Fair and Midtown Art Fair come into focus this weekend.

But that’s not the only game in the region; the remaining summer, as well as fall, hold even more art fairs to be enjoyed.

Belle Isle Art Fair

Saturday and Sunday, Belle Isle, Detroit

Over 100 artists are expected to present their works on the popular island destination on the Detroit River for a weekend of creative celebration. Held next to Scott Fountain, it will also feature a wide selection of food trucks, as well as a beer tent benefiting Detroit Repertory Theatre.

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belleisleartfair.com

Midtown Art Fair

Sunday, 111 E. Kirby St., Detroit

The third annual Midtown Art Fair is Michigan’s only fully accessible event dedicated to the diversity, equity and inclusion of all of Michigan’s artists, performers and citizens. This year, the fair will host the national Caravan for Disability Freedom and Justice, and will feature over 40 visual artists, crafters and vendors. The event runs from noon-6 p.m.

Milford Memories

Aug. 9-11, downtown Milford

Some 300 artists are expected for this annual summer festival that includes food options from almost 30 different vendors, plus sand volleyball, a cornhole tournament, a Sunday 5K race, fitness demonstrations, a rock climbing wall and multiple live bands in the beer tent.

milfordmemories.com

Brighton Street Art Fair

Aug. 23-25, downtown Brighton

About 150 artists will be featured on the streets of downtown Brighton, along with live entertainment, children’s activities and more.

brightoncoc.org

Arts, Beats & Eats

Aug. 30-Sept. 2, downtown Royal Oak

This massive Labor Day bash boasts 200 musical acts on nine stages and draws 300,000 attendees annually to jam to the music, peruse fine art and munch on food from a wide number of the region’s most popular restaurants and mobile kitchens.

artsbeatseats.com

More:Arts, Beats & Eats announces 2024 music lineup with Cheap Trick, Tesla, Keith Sweat, more

Art in the Village

Sept. 2, Franklin Road between 13 and 14 Mile, Franklin

Art in the Village, Franklin’s fine art fair, will celebrate its 43rd year on Labor Day, Monday, Sept. 2, from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Featured are exceptional works in glass, pottery, fiber, furniture, jewelry, photography, painting, watercolor, wood, sculpture, metal and more. Live music performances will occur through the day, as well.

franklinartinthevillage.org

Art & Apples Festival

Sept. 6-8, Rochester Municipal Park, Rochester

Now in its 59th year, the Art and Apples Festival brings together more than 200 artists plus live entertainment, food trucks, a kids zone and opportunities to create your own art.

pccart.org

Funky Ferndale Art Fair

Sept. 20-22, downtown Ferndale

More than 140 juried artists and authors will set up on Nine Mile west of Woodward Avenue for a celebration that spans downtown Ferndale.

funkyferndaleartfair.com

Ferndale DIY Street Fair

Sept. 20-22, east side of Woodward between E. Nine Mile Road and E. Troy Street

An annual three-day event where bands, artists, crafters, Michigan breweries, wineries, distilleries, restaurants, food trucks, businesses, non-profits, organizations and others who live and work with a Do-It-Yourself ethic and spirit converge for one big celebration.

ferndalediy.com

Birmingham Street Art Fair

Sept. 28-29, Shain Park, Birmingham

Marking its 50th anniversary this year, the Birmingham Street Art Fair will be held in downtown Birmingham’s Shain Park.

theguild.org/fair/common-ground-art-fair

A2 Artoberfest

Oct. 28-29, downtown Ann Arbor

Stretching across Ann Street and N. Fourth Avenue from Huron into the Kerrytown area, this intimate arts celebration will feature 100 jury-selected artists, live entertainment, food vendors, art activities and several adult beverage offerings.

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Although the rally was scheduled to take place in front of the Parliament building, the protesting artists had to change the location to Ananda Cinema Hall premises as there was another programme going on at Manik Mia Avenue.

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List of remaining 2024 metro Detroit summer art festivals

Belle Isle Art Fair