ACCA expanded its public programs and digital communications in 2011. A new series of lectures by the Artistic Director, A Hundred Works that Matter and Why, was fully subscribed and participation grew in ACCA’s regular Wednesday night talks series. Late night opening hours during the Melbourne Festival also encouraged a cross-fertilization of audiences from theatre and dance events on the precinct. Subscribers to ACCA’s e-bulletin also continued to grow and traffic through Facebook, Twitter and website expanded sharply, assisted by new blogs and online videos that used new ways for ACCA to communicate with art lovers. ACCA’s publishing program also continued in 2011 with the production of five new exhibition catalogues that included commissioned texts by Luca Cerizza, Donald Brook and Dominic Eichler.
Wednesday Nights at ACCA
Free floor talks and lectures in the ACCA foyer were held regularly on Wednesday evenings during each exhibition season. Discussions focused on ideas and issues arising from current exhibitions and recent developments in contemporary art. Audience participation in the discussion was actively encouraged, and the shift in timeslot from Sunday to Wednesday evening proved successful with attendance increasing by over 100%.
In Conversation – Juliana Engberg in conversation with Hannah Mathews
15 March 2011
Private viewing of the exhibition NEW011.
In Conversation – Curator, Hannah Mathews in conversation with artists Rebecca Baumann, Brendan Van Hek and Annie Wu
16 March 2011
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW011.
In Conversation – Curator, Hannah Mathews in conversation with artists, Fiona Abicare, Mark Hilton and Dan Moynihan
23 March 2011
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW011.
In Conversation – Curator, Hannah Mathews in conversation with artists, Greatest Hits and Tim Coster
30 March 2011
In Conversation – Curator, Hannah Mathews in conversation with director, Adam Harding
7 May 2011
Held in conjunction with Art#2 ACCA Regional Tour exhibition at Horsham Regional Art Gallery
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW011.
Special Forum – Your Civic Beauty: Piazzas, Plazas and Placemaking for the masses
29 June 2011
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Appearances, a discussion about constructing place for the masses with moderator Professor Rob Adams AM (City of Melbourne) and speakers Gilbert Rochecouste (Village Well), Ammon Beyerie (Here Studio), Professor Sue Anne Ware (RMIT)
Family Art-Making Workshop – BLU TACK ROCOCO!
15 July 2011
Workshop with artist-in-residence Alex Pittendrigh held in conjunction with Art#2 at Hamilton Art Gallery
State of Design Festival Events at ACCA
For the first three nights of the Festival, ACCA and State of Design co-hosted three evenings of activity in July:
- Pecha Kucha Night – Brake, Break, Broke
20 July 2011
Presented by here studio, a special edition of Pecha Kucha prerecorded on Nathan Coley’s concrete plinth at ACCA focused on designs that move as part of opening night of the State of Design Festival.Speakers included from Tramsessions, Nicklas Wallberg, artists Sarah Barrow & Michelle Gordon, architect Jeremy McLeod, cartoonist Michael Leunig, inventor Danielle Wilde, and fashion designer Liam Revell - Radio Broadcast – The Architects
21 July 2011 - Film – Speakeasy Cinema
22 July 2011
Speakeasy invited designers, filmmakers and creative thinkers to consider how title design frames a film’s mood.
Special Forum – A Sort of Homecoming
10 August 2011
A discussion about the future of a history that almost nearly happened with moderator Ben Naparstek (editor, The Monthly) speakers Leon Gettler (author), Rebecca Forgasz (director, Jewish Museum of Australia), Ellie Golvan (chairperson, The Australian Zionist Youth Council)
Susan Phillipsz: You look at things differently by hearing things differently
18 August 2011
Susan Phillipsz discussed her 2010 Turner Prize winning sound installation Lowlands Away, sharing her experiences working with public forgotten spaces, sound, and the untrained human voice.
In Conversation – artist, David Rosetzky in conversation with choreographer, Lucy Guerin and screen critic, Jake Wilson
21 September 2011
Held in conjunction with the exhibition David Rosetzky: How to Feel.
Talk – Olaf Nicolai illustrated artist talk
7 October 2011
Held in conjunction with Power to the People: Contemporary Conceptualism and the Object in Art.
Talk – Silent Partners: Angus Cameron (author and emissary)
12 & 15 October 2011
Two talks that outline aspects of the project Looking for Headless, presented in conjunction with the exhibition Power to the People: Contemporary Conceptualism and the Object in Art.
Lecture Series: 100 Works that Matter and Why
This new ticketed series of ten lectures by Artistic Director, Juliana Engberg, attracted much interest and was fully subscribed. Focusing predominantly on the artists, the movements, the history and the cultural context of 20th century art, the series was attended by a range of art interested people including collectors, teachers and patrons wanting to know more about the background to contemporary art practice.
27 April 2011
‘You can be a museum, or you can be modern, but you can’t be both’ Gertrude Stein. Introduction to the concepts of contemporary art after modernism
4 May 2011
Get the Gestalt: The Rise of the Spectator in post-Sixties practice.
11 May 2011
Land Ho! Earth art and the emergence of nomadic mappings
18 May 2011
Sounds like… When the visual becomes sensory
25 May 2011
It ain’t the meat it’s the motion: Performance, but not as we know it
17 August 2011
Back to the Future: Post Modernity and the return of painting
24 August 2011
Yes Virginia, there are women artists: Feminism, photos and theory
31 August 2011
To video or not: The rise and fall of new media
7 September 2011
The little girl in Melanie Klein wants to make a mess: Strategies of installation part I
14 September 2011
Boys will be Boys: Strategies in Installation part II
Sound and Video Files
Sound files were produced for each exhibition and posted on the ACCA website where they were accessed by students and the general public.
Multicultural Art Program (MAP)
The last of ACCA’s specially devised series of workshops for recently arrived young people from a variety of cultural backgrounds, including refugees, took place in February 2011. Funded by the Scanlon Foundation, and in partnership with the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, MAP provided opportunities for young people new to Australia to participate in an immersive art experience across a variety of forms of visual arts, theatre and dance, Initiated, presented and managed by ACCA, each program included sessions by collaborating partners Chunky Move, St Martins Youth theatre and ACCA over several weekends.
EDUCATION PROGRAMS
ACCA’s education delivery continued to grow in 2011 with overall student attendance figures increasing by 18% from 2010. In particular ACCA has expanded its primary program, with the help of the Potter Foundation to develop its MAKE and THINK programs which have been very appealing to primary groups. Primary student attendance increased by 43% in 2011. Regional participation increased by 50% due to the Art#2 programs.
Participation by children from the Western Metropolitan Region increased by 46% and the Northern Metropolitan Region increased by 118% due to the GO program which has focused on helping schools in disadvantaged areas to access the gallery. Now in its 4th year the program provides free bus transportation to ACCA for eligible schools. Many of these schools have become repeat visitors and have started to find their own way to ACCA, allowing us to make the Go program available to other schools.
In 2011 ACCA’s Education Services delivered 6 integrated streams in its Pathways to Art:
1. TALK: Guided exhibition viewing and discussion. ACCA’s core discussion based education program. Through discussions led by trained teachers in gallery spaces students had the ideas and concepts of contemporary art unpacked in a way that was relevant to their school curriculum. Talk was a free program for all primary and secondary students.
2. MAKE: Contemporary art materials based workshops. ACCA’s core practical based education program for school students and teachers. Free artist guided practical art making workshops using contemporary materials were designed to complement ACCA’s annual exhibition program to foster deeper engagement with exhibition content.
3. THINK Philosophy of art for kids. helped primary school students search for meaning through fun collaborative inquiry and philosophical dialogue.
4. ACCA Digital Delivery. ACCA e-communications have substantially increased and have become a major feature of our public programs and access with interviews, conversation recordings, behind the scenes vision, blogs and many other programs down-loadable from the ACCA website. Sound files and video files were produced for each exhibition and posted on the ACCA website where they are well used by students and general public. The ACCA Blog was launched as part of the Venice Pop Up and immediately attracted an enthusiastic readership.
5. Infocube functioned as a communications kiosk and research facility for students and teachers, providing access to archived digital information about artist and exhibitions at ACCA. Relevant support material, in the form of video, image, text and sound files was uploaded prior to each exhibition.
6. ACCA Art Partners. ACCA worked in partnership with philanthropic organisations to provide the following targeted learning programs linked with the pathways to Art program:
ACCA’s successful and growing Go Program supported the participation of students who attend lower socio-economic schools. The program improved access for students who may otherwise not have the opportunity to gain a significant cultural experience through the provision of free bus transport to and from ACCA.
Arts immersion: Starting Points provided regionally based Year 9-12 students from Government schools with an immersive arts experience across the forms of visual arts, theatre and dance. Sessions were hosted in collaboration with Malthouse Theatre and Chunky Move.
The ARTCONNECT9 program in collaboration with the Victorian Arts Centre continued to provide Year 9 level students and teachers from Victorian regional government schools with ‘pathways to Art’ learning experience.
Teachers’ Professional Development Evenings were exclusive viewings of exhibitions that included a tour with the curator and wine and canapés on arrival:
17 March 2011: Held in conjunction with NEW11
9 June 2011: Held in conjunction with Nathan Coley: Appearances
11 August 2011: Held in conjunction with David Rosetzky: How to Feel and Yael Bartana: …and Europe will be stunned
13 October 2011: Held in conjunction with Power to the People: Contemporary Conceptualism and the Object in Art
Art Smart – Kids Summer Holiday Workshops included a tour through the current exhibition and a Philosophy of Art workshop and a MAKE session held in the January school holidays and focussed on the exhibition Pipilotti Rist: I Packed the Postcard in my Suitcase.