Double Life

3 - 24 July 2009

Lesley Duxbury
Joy Hirst
Ruth Johnstone
Lyndal Jones
Philip Samartzis

Curator and Essay by Lisa Byrne

Artists share their phenomenological experiences of rural Victoria to address real-life environmental issues such as drought, bushfires, flood and land/water degradation through their research practices.

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Essay

Each of the five artist-researchers in this exhibition lives and/or works between two geographical locations in Victoria. All of their respective research practices are connected with locations outside the city of Melbourne. Whether it be through collating audio recordings of natural environments in and around Bogong; introducing "others" to the specific issues of climate change through the development of a residency program at The Swiss House, Avoca, titled The Avoca Project Inc; investigating, tracing and walking the tidal flats of the coastal shelves in and around Port Phillip Bay; regenerating eucalypt flora affected by fire through collecting and remaking remnants of flora samples around Mt Beauty; or elaborating on the experiential nature of bushfire in the environs of Briagolong, the works on exhibition in Double Life intrinsically weave an informed knowledge of a location within a professional research context. The specific negotiations of place through sound and visual investigation provide viewers with a unique way in which to appreciate the effects of flood, drought, fire, and land and water degradation within the language of art. The works orient the viewer toward other valuable ways in which to understand climatic impact beyond the conventional literacies of climate change.

Lisa Byrne, 2009

Catalogue

Invitation

Supported by

Double Life has been generously supported by the RMIT's Design Research Institute Seeding Funding Program in 2008. This project will be accompanied by a full colour publication of artist interviews and exhibition documentation to be released in December 2009.