Rewind: The final count down
Douglas Gordon, Everything is nothing without its relfection; A Photographic Pantomine, 2013. 180 framed photographs, 180 framed mirrors of various sizes. Installation view ACCA, 2014. photo: Andrew Curtis
By Hannah Mathews
In 1984 ACCA opened its doors in a modestly-scaled gardener’s cottage located in Melbourne’s inner city Domain gardens. In its first 12 months of operation, under the guidance of independent curator John Buckley, ACCA hosted a rising international art star (Keith Haring), brought together three of Melbourne’s hottest young artistic talents (David Larwill, Juan Davila and Howard Arkley), and delivered an exhibition that considered painting, sculpture and architecture in the same conversation.
Quickly establishing itself as a national hot spot for contemporary art, ACCA’s ambitions continued to grow throughout the late 1980s and 1990s under the leadership of three artistic directors (Richard Perram 1986-89, Grazia Gunn 1989-91, and Jenepher Duncan 1991-2001). Despite increasing financial precariousness and limited staff resources, the distinct vision of each director saw ACCA deliver a range of artistic and critical programs that consistently addressed local activity, engaged with international conversations, and sought to grow audiences for art.
Pipilotti Rist, I Packed the Postcard in My Suitcase. Installation view, ACCA 2011. Courtesy the artist and ACCA Archive
Thirty years on from its inception, ACCA now occupies an iconic, purpose-built building in Melbourne’s Southbank precinct. Under the artistic directorship of Juliana Engberg (2002 – ) and executive direction of Kay Campbell (2002 – ) it has earned itself an international reputation as a commissioning centre for international and local contemporary art.
ACCA’s commitment to art and artists continues to hold strong: commissioning ambitiously scaled and challenging art works; regularly bringing local and international artists into conversation with each other; growing audiences for contemporary art with projects conceived for both city, regional and international audiences; remaining committed to producing and presenting new art works; and growing a program of educational and public events that share, challenge and compliment the field of contemporary art.
Barbara Kruger, installation view, ACCA, 2005. Courtesy ACCA Archive
In the last 12 years ACCA has shown works by internationally acclaimed artists including Jenny Holzer, Callum Morton, Shirin Nishat, Pipilotti Rist, Geoff Lowe, Barbara Kruger, Mike Nelson, Tracey Moffatt, Richard Billingham, Mikala Dwyer, Berlinde de Bruykere, Douglas Gordon, Daniel von Sturmer, David Noonan, David Rosetsky, Tacita Dean, Monika Sosnowska, Maria Hassabi, Susan Norrie, Joseph Kosuth, Angelica Mesiti, among many others.
Over its 30-year history ACCA has worked with more than 2,300 artists, curators and writers; presented over 365 exhibitions, and produced 288 publications. It has grown an impressive alumni that includes artists who have represented Australia at various international exhibitions, directors who have curated some of the most significant exhibitions in our recent history, staff who have gone on to fill key roles in institutions throughout Australia and overseas, and patrons whose support has helped sustain contemporary art.
Monika Sosnowska, Regional Modernities, installation view, ACCA 2013. Courtesy the Artist. Photograph: Andrew Curtis
ACCA was the first arts organisation in Australia to embrace the possibilities of an active online profile. In addition to being an early adopter of the online blog, ACCA was the first to offer an online library of podcasts and artist videos. It was also the first to digitize its 30 years of programming history into an online archive freely accessible anywhere, anytime.
It has presented award winning education and outreach programs (including the Go Program which, since 2006, has provided free transport for over 8,500 students from disadvantaged schools to visit the gallery and surrounding arts precinct), and grown a volunteer program focused on developing the skills and knowledge of those wishing to be involved in the arts.
ACCA’s success is due in large part to the many people who have walked through its doors, shown work in its galleries, built walls, photographed shows, sat at its desks and answered its phones. Its success is also reflective of the Melbourne art world, which has regularly drawn together to support the organisation in its vision and provided the art and audiences that are essential to its mission.
As part of ACCA’s Our First 30 Years program, launched to celebrate the organisation’s anniversary, ACCA’s has invited many of these voices to go on the record. Each week for the past 51 weeks, individuals central to ACCA’s history have contributed texts on various exhibitions, personalities, moments and memories. Writers include: John Buckley, Ashley Crawford, Sue Cramer, Elizabeth Gertsakis, Lyndal Jones, Peter Cripps, Richard Perram, Robert Owen, Jenepher Phipps (vale), Grazia Gunn, Jenepher Duncan, Geoff Lowe, Anna Schwartz, Claire Williamson, Natalie King, Vikki McInnes, Lesley Alway, Naomi Cass, Bridget Crone, Philip Samartzis, Kay Campbell, Gabrielle de Vietri, Charlotte Day, Rebecca Coates, Jane Rhodes, Bianca Hester, Juliana Engberg, Katrina Hall, Julia Powles and Lauren Dornau. These >>REWIND texts have been published via ACCA’s weekly e-bulletin and now reside within ACCA’s online archive for viewing in perpetuity. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the writers and artists for their contributions.
While ACCA’s first 30 year celebrations draw to a close and the >>REWIND series pauses online, ACCA continues its collecting. Not art of course – its a kunsthalle – but there is a commitment to growing the archive and ACCA is on the look out for any additional information on ACCA’s history, shows, people and more. If you’ve got publications, happy snaps, a story to share please be in touch: 30years@accaonline.org.au
Here’s to the next 30 years!
Hannah Mathews is an Associate Curator at ACCA and coordinator of ACCA’s Our First 30 Years online archive project and Rewind series. She has been ably assisted by Lauren Dornau and Julia Powles, ACCA staff Emma Sullivan and Emma Anderson, and ACCA’s Executive Director, Kay Campbell, and Artistic Director, Juliana Engberg, who have provided valuable guidance and editorial support.
Also This Year
Douglas Gordon, Phantom, 2011. Stage, screen, black Steinway piano, burned Steinway piano and one monitor, dimensions variable. Courtesy: the artist, Studio lost but found and Galerie Yvon Lambert, Paris
14 May, Sydney Morning Herald, Art as extreme sport for next Biennale
1 July, Broadsheet, Juliana Engberg: Leading from the Front
1 July, ABC arts, Juliana Engberg, on curating
13 July, InsideArt, Juliana Engberg Queen of Contemporary
30 October, The Australian, Running the emotional gamut
3 December, artsHub, Contemporary art’s work-a-day champion
Public programs, education, and events
Patricia Piccinini, Skywhale at ACCA December 2013. Photo: David Johns
Building on its successful night-time public programs, ACCA introduced regular late night hours on Wednesdays and a number of new free and ticketed talks and events. The lecture series isms featuring Artistic Director, Juliana Engberg and other guest lecturers continued to focus on art history. Art think/art shrink was a popular new initiative featuring a philosopher and a psychoanalyst. In 2013 ACCA’s international guest lecturer series included James Lingwood (curator and director of London’s Artangel); Aleksandra Wasilkowska (interdisciplinary Polish architect) and Tacita Dean (artist). The ACCA Artbar continued on the last Friday of each exhibition season, attracting a young crowd keen to combine art viewing with the latest musical talent. A new addition to ACCA’s programs was the highly successful ACCA Mega Quiz which was a sold out event.
Patricia Piccinini: Skywhale
2 December 2013
Patricia Piccinini’s flight of fancy, SKYWHALE, set sail from the forecourt of ACCA during the week commencing 2 December.
PUBLIC PROGRAMS, EDUCATION AND EVENTS
In Conversation – NEW13
20 March 2013
Curator Charlotte Day in conversation with artists Benjamin Forster, Alex Martinis Roe, Jess MacNeil and Sanné Mestrom.
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW13.
In Conversation – NEW13
27 March 2013
Curator Charlotte Day in conversation with artists Scott Mitchell, Joshua Petherick and Linda Tegg.
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW13.
Event – Mega Quiz Night
15 May 2013
For one night only ACCA transformed its biggest gallery into an arena-spectacular of brains and pop-culture prowess.
In Conversation – Hannah Mathews in conversation with Mikala Dwyer
27 May 2013
Held in conjunction with the exhibitions Mikala Dwyer: Goldene Bend’er and Daria Martin: One of the Things that Makes me Doubt.
Artist Talk – Mikala Dwyer
29 May 2013
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Mikala Dwyer: Goldene Bend’er.
Talk– Dream a little dream
5 June 2013
A discussion with Jungian analyst, Annette Lowe, consultant psychiatrist, Dr Nathan Serry, and psychological scientist Dr Russell Conduit. Chaired by writer and critic Martyn Pedler.
Held in conjunction with the exhibitions Mikala Dwyer: Goldene Bend’er and Daria Martin: One of the Things that Makes me Doubt.
In Conversation – Art Think, Art Shrink
19 June 2013
Philosopher Mairead Phillips and psychiatrist Jonathan Phillips in conversation about the exhibitions Mikala Dwyer: Goldene Bend’er and Daria Martin: One of the Things that Makes me Doubt.
Workshop – Sculptural Drawing
26 June 2013
Observational drawing workshop inside Mikala Dwyer: Goldene Bend’er.
Lecture Series – A Short History of the ISMs
1 July: Juliana Engberg on Realism
8 July: Juliana Engberg on Impressionism
17 July: Juliana Engberg on Surrealism
24 July: Anthony White on Abstract Expressionism
31 July: Callum Morton on Minimalism
21 August: Edward Colless on Postmodernism
28 August: Callum Morton on Installation-ism
4 September: Edward Colless on Catastrophism
30 September: Juliana Engberg on Now-ism
Special Event – ACCA Art Bar
26 July 2013
Late night art, drinks and new music with improvised vocal and electronic sounds of Galapagoose and music by Two Bright Lakes.
Held in conjunction with the exhibitions Mikala Dwyer: Goldene Bend’er and Daria Martin: One of the Things that Makes me Doubt.
In Conversation – Charlotte Day and Monika Sosnowska
13 August 2013
Walk through Monika Sosnowska’s ambitious spatial and architectural installation with curator, Charlotte Day and artist, Monika Sosnowska.
Talk – Shadow Architecture
14 August 2013
Polish architect, editor and thinker Aleksandra Wasikowska discussed the ways in which art, architecture, street vendors and market-stall holders are shaping cities all over the world.
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Monika Sosnowska: Regional Modernities.
Workshop – Sculptural Drawing
25 September 2013
An unguided workshop to refine or experiment with drawing techniques held amongst Monika Sosnowska’s psychologically charged architectural installations.
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Monika Sosnowska: Regional Modernities.
Lecture – Tacita Dean on Film
10 October 2013
A public lecture given by artist Tacita Dean to coincide with the exhibition FILM.
Workshop – Collage and Life Drawing
20 November 2013
An unguided workshop for experimenting with techniques of the handmade was held in conjunction with the exhibitions In the Cut and Tacita Dean: Film.
Special Event – Speed Painters at the ACCA Art Bar
22 November 2013
A night of slo-mo disco from brothers Tig and Nick Huggins in collaboration with Jon Tjhia (ii) and horn player Oscar O’Bryan.
In Conversation – Patricia Piccinini, artist
2 December 2013
Artist, Patricia Piccinini, in conversation with impresario, Robyn Archer AO, at a special breakfast event hosted by ACCA in partnership with Leonard Joel.
EDUCATION PROGRAMS
ACCA’s education programs was devised to align with school curricular at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels. They focused on specific areas of philosophy and haptic learning at the primary levels, interdisciplinary and cross-curricular interpretations at the secondary levels, and discussion-based learning at the tertiary levels.
In 2013 ACCA’s Education Services delivered six integrated streams in its Pathways to Art:
1. TALK
ACCA’s schools program focused on haptic and kinaesthetic learning, through moving, touching and doing.
2. MAKE
These workshops were designed to complement ACCA’s annual exhibition program and to foster deeper engagement with exhibition content through haptic learning approaches. Children consolidated their understandings of the concepts in the exhibition and philosophical discussion by creating their own artwork.
3. THINK
The ‘Philosophy of Art for Children’ program used the community of inquiry approach to introduce children to conceptual art, showing that the idea can be more important than aesthetic and artistic skill, and inspiring them to think creatively.
4. ACCA Digital Delivery
ACCA e-communications substantially increased becoming a major feature of 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 were well used by students and general public.
5. INFOCUBE
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 targeted learning programs linked with the Pathways to Art program:
The 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:
Getting to Grips with Contemporary Art
18 March 2013
Designed to engage and inspire VCE Art and Studio Art teachers with contemporary art practice, this was an intensive, full day program that featured presentations from Juliana Engberg, Charlotte Day, VCE Art exams co-chief assessors, Andrew Landrigan & Kathy Hendy-Ekers, and NEW13 artist, Jess MacNeil.
Make it, then teach it!
9 October 2013
A day for primary and secondary teachers to work with four artists (Ry Haskings, Alex Pittendrigh, Hanna Chetwin, Georgina Glanville) in a fun, skills-based workshop using contemporary materials and techniques to create simple art activities for the classroom. The workshop was followed by an exclusive preview of Tacita Dean’s FILM.
Also This Year
4 May, The Age, Haring mural conflict
31 July, The Australian, Australian curator raring to drive biennial visual arts juggernaut
28 July, The Age, Scenes from a playful heart
1 August, The Age, Engberg to juggle twin roles with Sydney biennale post
November 2012, Wish, National Awards of the Australian Institute of Architects
21 December, The Age, Blow by blow Mesiti takes on mountainous task
27 December, The Age, Curators broaden our horizons
27 Decmber, The Age, High Art
Public programs, education, and events
In 2012 the ACCA Art Bar was launched in partnership with Audi, bringing new audiences to ACCA on the last Friday evening of each exhibition season. ACCA also continued to grow its public programs and explore new ways of capturing the imagination and attention of audiences. The ticketed lecture series, A Further 50 Works, was a highly successful initiative that focused on 50 iconic art works that have influenced the contemporary art world. Delivered by ACCA’s Artistic Director, Juliana Engberg, this program quickly sold out to eager audiences.
Wednesday Nights at ACCA
Wednesday nights at ACCA were held regularly during each exhibition season. Discussion focused on ideas and issues arising from exhibitions and recent developments in contemporary art. Audience participation in the discussions was invited and encouraged. Sessions included artist talks, forums, lectures, conversations and panel discussions.
In Conversation – Jeff Khan, curator and Katie Lee and Charlie Sofo, artists
21 March 2012
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW12.
In Conversation – Jeff Khan, curator and Kate Mitchell, Angelica Mesiti, artists
28 March 2012
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW12.
Guided Tour – Lunchtime defrag
30 April 2012
Guided tour/meditation session of NEW12 with Tibetan Lama, Khentrul Rinpoche.
Event – ACCA ART BAR
10 May 2012
Drinks accompanied by Fox & Sui, dreamy electro-pop band.
Talk – On Flesh
20 June 2012
A talk held in conjunction with the Berlinde De Bruyckere: We are all flesh exhibition chaired by Martyn Pedler, writer & critic with speakers: Dr Robyn Warner, meat scientist; Lance Proctor, embalmer; Dr Wendy Haslem, academic; Prof Nick Halam, psychologist and Adrian Richardson, butcher, chef and author.
Workshop – Drawing the last breath
27 June 2012
A drawing class held in conjunction with the Berlinde De Bruyckere: We are all flesh exhibition.
In Conversation – The word became flesh
11 July 2012
Dr Rachael Kohn and Dr Claire Renkin in conversation with Juliana Engberg.
Held in conjunction with the Berlinde De Bruyckere: We are all flesh exhibition.
Event – The Last Supper
18 July 2012
An evening of art, music, wine and freshly baked bread.
Held in conjunction with the Berlinde De Bruyckere: We are all flesh exhibition.
Event – ACCA ART BAR
26 July 2012
Drinks accompanied by Galapagoose, an improvised vocal and electronic sounds.
Talk – ACCA & VCA Artist Talks
9 & 14 August 2012
Artists Shahryar Nashat, Tatiana Trouvé, and Nairy Baghramian talked about their work in the exhibition, Sculptural Matter.
Talk – On À Rebours
29 August 2012
Sexologist Cyndi Darnell; writer, social commentator and co-author, Monica Dux; and psychologist, Milena Mirabelli discussed feminism, fetishism, surrealism and psychoanalysis. Chaired by Professor of Art Theory, Dr Anne Marsh.
Held in conjunction with the Pat Brassington: A Rebours exhibition.
Event – Dark Matter
5 September 2012
A late night bar and gallery opening for Sculptural Matter and Pat Brassington: A Rebours, with performance by VJs Eugenia Lim and Jessie Scott.
Workshop – Sculptural & Life Drawing
12 September 2012
Untutored life and observational drawing class held in conjunction with the Sculptural Matter exhibition
Event – Program Launch and Special Preview
10 October 2012
Official launch of the Melbourne International Arts Festival’s Visual Arts program with Artistic Director of MIAF, Brett Sheehy, Juliana Engberg and Santiago Sierra in conversation.
In Conversation – On OURSELVES
17 October 2012
Discussion with psychologist, author, comedian and disability activist, Dr Cordelia Fine; social worker, Roberta Honigman; Stella Young, psychologist; Prof Nick Haslam, Prof Rajiv Khosla and chaired by writer and critic, Martyn Pedler.
Held in conjunction with the OURSELVES exhibition.
EDUCATION PROGRAMS
Education programs were devised to align with school curricular at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels as part of ACCA’s core information delivery, and by extension, its participation in growing a culturally aware and knowledgeable public. ACCA’s education programs focused on specific areas of philosophy and haptic learning at the primary levels, interdisciplinary and cross-curricular interpretations at the secondary levels, and discussion-based learning at the tertiary levels.
In 2012 ACCA’s Education Services delivered six integrated streams in its Pathways to Art:
1. Talk
ACCA’s schools program focused on haptic and kinaesthetic learning, through moving, touching and doing. Installation art provided students with a fully immersive environment to explore ideas and meaning through discussion and art making.
2. MAKE
These workshops were designed to complement ACCA’s annual exhibition program and to foster deeper engagement with exhibition content through haptic learning approaches. Children consolidated their understandings of the concepts in the exhibition and philosophical discussion by creating their own artwork to foster visual and verbal literacy.
3. Think
A ‘community of inquiry’ was the central pedagogical tool for the ‘Philosophy for Children’ program. This method introduced children to conceptual art, showing that the idea/concept is more important than the aesthetic and artistic skill, inspiring them to think creatively in order to express an idea. The approach also generated questions and encouraged students to be active listeners, learning to respect the opinions of others and work together as a group
4. ACCA Digital Delivery
ACCA e-communications substantially increased and became a major feature of 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 for students and general public. The ACCA Blog was launched as part of the Venice Pop Up and immediately attracted an enthusiastic readership.
5. Infocube
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/Preview Evenings were exclusive viewings of exhibitions that included a tour with the curator and refreshments:
22 March 2012: Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW12.
7 June 2012: Held in conjunction with the exhibition Berlinde De Bruyckere: We are all flesh
14 August 2012: Teachers’ preview and Arts Education Victoria Annual General Meeting held in conjunction with Sculptural Matter and Pat Brassington: A Rebours exhibitions
18 October 2012: Held in conjunction with OURSELVES exhibition.
Rewind: They say the Venice Biennale is the Olympics of the art world
Anastasia Klose, Vernissage of the 54th Venice Biennale. Courtesy the artist and ACCA Archive
By Katrina Hall
They say the Venice Biennale is the Olympics of the art world, and while I have no way of measuring whether or not that is true, one thing I can tell you is that people do run very fast there.
I noticed it on the first day of the Vernissage preview period. The turnstyles opened and they were off. A coiffured bunch of black-clad curator types sprinted up the main drag of the Giardini to the British Pavilion to beat the queue for Mike Nelson’s I, Impostor, the big ticket exhibition for the 2011 Biennale.
People do everything fast during Vernissage because there is so much to see and it all has to be seen. So gallerists, collectors, critics and artists alike devour their breakfast Panini’s in record time and set off for a marathon run of art seeing, party going, Prosecco drinking and talking, talking, talking.
Stuart Ringholt, 54th Venice Biennale. Courtesy the artist and ACCA Archive
And, in 2011 I am there too, with a small team of artists and ACCA curators, who have decided, bravely, to mount a ‘pop-up’ at the 54th Venice Biennale.
The idea was to showcase, at the world’s most important art event, the performance-based trend in contemporary Australian art and the breadth of talent in Australian art generally. The Venice Pop-Up was one of a series mounted by ACCA in galleries around Victoria, and in a shipping container on the ACCA Forecourt.
Artists Laresa Kosloff, Stuart Ringholt and Anastasia Klose accepted Artistic Director Juliana Engberg’s challenge to make a project without walls, each constructing performance pieces that would create a sense of surprise in the Venice environment. Laresa was to hobble around the city with a fake broken leg, asking other artists to sign the plaster, Stuart was to do some sci-fi-style teleporting, whilst Anastasia was planning to take her lonely yet ever hopeful bride to the city of love.
Charlotte Day became the co-ordinating curator, with Liv Barrett along as intern. Juliana and Charlotte blogged blogged blogged and back at the ranch Emma Sullivan was on stand-by at midnight to load up the stories. ACCA was ahead of the news game. People on the ground in Venice would say…oh I’m reading the ACCA blog for what to see.
On that first morning, when Anastasia sauntered into the gardens wearing a wedding dress and the words ‘Nana I am still searching’ on a cardboard sign around her neck, we knew the idea had legs. The art-crowd came out of the French and Russian pavilions to take a look, albeit quickly, because everything has to be fast in Venice, but it was enough.
Luc Tymans signing Laresa Kosloff’s cast, 54th Venice Biennale. Courtesy the artist and ACCA Archive
And when internationally acclaimed Turner prize winning artist Grayson Perry, also dressed as a femme, put his arm around Anastasia, and then international actress Rachel Griffith gave her a hug we knew ACCA’s unofficial art tour of the official Venice Biennale gardens was a hit.
ACCA Pop-Up Program: VENICE
1-3 June 2011
Artists: Anastasia Klose, Stuart Ringholt, and Laresa Kosloff
Katrina Hall has been ACCA’s publicist since 2004. She writes a column for The Weekly Review and will next year be in Venice to work with the Australia Council on the launch of the new Australian Pavilion and Fiona Hall’s exhibition Wrong Way Time.
Also This Year
10 May 2011, The Age, Blowing Venice out of the water. Photo: Rodger Cummins
27 April, The Age, Deans Vienna dares to step outside the waltz
10 May, The Age, Blowing Venice out of the water
13 May, The Age, Pioneer keen to make his mark at Bonhams
1 June, The Age, Guerilla artists to Venice
3 June, The Age, A bridge over troubled leguna
Issue 19 June, Das Super Paper, Sinking Dreams: ACCA in Venice
Issue 1174, Inpress, Sad John
11 July, The Age, You say dyspeptic I say inspiring MONA provokes fierce debate
July/August, Insite Magazine, Art Club
28 December, The Age, Reflecting an artists paradoxes
30 December, The Saturday Age, Cheeking artist heading to Germany
The Age, Premiers state of the art plans
Public Programs, Education and Events
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%.
2011 Melbourne Festival Program guide
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.
Rewind: Mortality
Annika von Hausswolff, Hey Buster! What do you know about desire?, 1993 (detail). Courtesy the artist and Moderna Museet, Stockholm
By Julia Powles
"Tomorrow, when I wake, or think I do, what shall I say of today?"
– Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot
Mortality is the recognition of inevitability. As we know, all things pass and our mortality outlines a journey along which there are certain markers, or stages, that we all pass through. We are born; we are infants, children, teenagers, adolescents, and young adults. We grow and at each stage there are unique opportunities for understanding, contemplation and reflection, as well as moments of sheer wonder, phenomenological experiences that form our deep, unspoken human knowledge.
In October 2010, as part of the Melbourne International Arts Festival, curated by Juliana Engberg, ACCA held the epic exhibition Mortality. Designed to take the viewer on a journey from birth to death, 48 artworks from 31 artists were presented in a sequence based on the ideas of the well-known developmental psychologist Erik Erikson’s seven stages of identity. Commencing with Fiona Tan’s 2002 video Tilt, in which a baby is lifted, chuckling with joy, into the air by helium balloons, and concluding with Tony Orsler’s lone, dangling light bulb, the exhibition explored and exposed the true nature of our mortality, where the contemplation of life’s journey necessarily and inevitably acknowledges our inability to hold control.
When the baby carried by balloons grows, and in turn becomes a parent she will understand in her very being the risk involved in setting one’s children free, and will feel the same conflicted ambiguity that I felt when I watched the video, a mix between hopeful optimism and fear for an unpredictable future.
Fiona Tan, Tilt, 2002. Courtesy the artist
Photography formed a considerable component of the exhibition, and this is no surprise. Photography is our medium for remembering. What family does not have a family album, and who does not love to look at photos of themselves when they were younger? However, as Susan Sontag points out in her essay, On Photography, photography in fact aids in our forgetting as much as it does our remembering, with unpleasant family events, such as divorce and illness rarely recorded.
An exception to this was Melanie Boreham’s use of her parent’s divorce as the subject of an artwork. As a ritual of separation, Boreham filmed her father cutting off lengths of her mother’s hair, which was then carried off by balloons. The landscape in which the couple stand, a rocky platform on the edge of the sea, acts as a metaphor for the ‘unknown’ into which they are now passing. Life, Boreham reminds us, holds uncertainties, things that were once rock solid become amorphous, as impossible to define as the changing shoreline.
Peter Kennedy, People Who Died the Day I was Born – April 18, 1945, 1998. Courtesy the artist and ACCA Archive
Throughout the exhibition, as the viewer journeyed through rooms signalling developmental milestones various, visual motifs recurred – balloons for example, as mentioned, and in many artworks we encountered flight. There is perhaps no more perfect tale than that of Icarus, who flew too close to the sun, to illustrate the desire we have to transcend our mortal condition. Landscape with The Fall of Icarus by Mark Wallinger involved a series of short films, each showing men attempting, but failing, to lift themselves off the ground. Often comedic in their predictability, the men pit their feeble wits against the law of gravity to no avail. By locating Wallinger’s work in the ‘mid-life’ section of the exhibition there may have been a wry nod to the hard-won wisdom that comes with maturity, as it is in our middle age that we grapple with the reality of our limitations, hopefully able to avoid the folly of hubris, yet still daring to dream.
Although conceived in our minds as a linear journey, for our own lived experience of mortality begins at one point and ends at another, life and death in fact coexist and there are times in life that our inability to control the world around us is frightening. I found myself turning away from the horror of the horse standing still in the middle of a highway, cars indifferently speeding past on both sides. Time After Time, Anri Sala’s video work reminds us that life isn’t kind to the vulnerable and disaffected. A powerfully metaphoric artwork, the image of the horse stamping its hind leg in confusion has stayed with me, in the way that only art can linger.
Towards the end of the Mortality journey was Charles Anderson’s installation of a room filled with objects from the past. Ladders, shovels, suitcases, chairs and desks were all partly bandaged, lit up in places by spots of neon suggestive of an afterglow. An infirmary of sorts, or possibly a repository for objects still yearning for human touch, I was reminded of Anderson’s work again recently when I saw that my father had cleaned out his shed, for the final time. ‘What should I do with my grandfather’s hand tools?’ he said to me, ‘they haven’t been used in years’.
Charles Anderson, dis/appearance: repatriation 1992 – 2010. Mortality installation view, ACCA, 2010. Courtesy the artist and ACCA Archive
Death, of course, formed the conclusion to Mortality, although it was also there at the beginning with Peter Kennedy’s neon work, People Who Died On The Day I Was Born. Both a sad and hopeful work, the simplicity of Kennedy’s list of names suggests the possibility of a greater human connection that extends beyond the constraints of the corporeal. ‘Not until we are lost do we begin to understand about life, ourselves and the world around us’ wrote philosopher Henry David Thoreau.
Reflecting back on Mortality, remembering the meandering labyrinth of rooms one moved through I wonder if our journey from birth to death is not merely a journey towards understanding, but also a journey towards compassion.
Mortality
8 October – 28 November 2010
Artists: Charles Anderson, George Armfield, Melanie Boreham, Bureau of Inverse Technology, Aleks Danko, Tacita Dean, Gabrielle De Vietri, Sue Ford, Garry Hill, Larry Jenkins, Peter Kennedy, Anastasia Klose, Arthur Lindsay, Dora Meeson, Anna Molska, TV Moore, Tony Oursler, Neil Pardington, Giulio Paolini, Mark Richards, David Rosetzky, Anri Sala, James Shaw, Louise Short, William Strutt, Darren Sylvester, Fiona Tan, Bill Viola, Annika von Hausswolff, Mark Wallinger, Lynette Wallworth, Gillian Wearing
Julia Powles is a curator and educator. In 2014 she has been working on ACCA’s First 30 Years archive program.
Rewind: Leave the windows open…
Bianca Hester
Bianca Hester, Please leave these windows open overnight o enable the fans to draw in cool air during the early hours of the morning, ACCA, 2010. Photograph: Ian Curtis.
This project involved marking out an arena for action. This action was distributed across a range of registers including the sculptural, material, spatial, institutional and social. Within this arena, the presence of sculptural elements such as a cinder-block wall, a sandstone boulder, ten cubic meters of dirt and various cast and fabricated forms dominated, indicating a preoccupation with materiality. However this focus upon materiality depended upon ephemerality, transition and change. States of change were solicited through programming ‘interruptions’ of the work by inviting beings (both human and non-human) to activate or perform, intermittently. This was initiated in order to set the whole project into motion and position ‘mutability’ as it’s subject. Alongside these staged interruptions, spontaneous engagements and interventions by the audience emerged throughout the duration of the exhibition, which effectively tested its limits in ways that couldn’t be anticipated in advance. This was a gift from the audience that brought an incredible energy to the project as well as contributing to my understanding of public space and processes of negotiation.
Bianca Hester, Please leave these windows open overnight o enable the fans to draw in cool air during the early hours of the morning, ACCA, 2010. Photograph: Bianca Hester (with Mousse and Jack Dowell).
These negotiations took place between all involved throughout the weave of the project: including its objects, materials, audiences, invigilators, the invited performers, the curators, and myself. As a consequence the work shifted from day to day, depending on what was going on (or not), who happened to be present, or which invigilator was hosting. We’ve learnt from the 60’s and the associated ‘performative turn’ in much contemporary art that this is the case for all artwork: that the activity of perception coupled with the object of that perception within a social (or institutional) context – gives rise to work that is co-produced as an event. This is as much the case for abstract painting as it is for installation. From this perspective, art emerges perpetually through a process of encounter. This inevitably depends on how you come at it and according to your position. This makes it a really slippery situation. I wanted this work to exaggerate and ‘exhibit’ this slippery process.
This situation demanded a constant process of ‘tending’. Like a garden, which calls out for compost, light, heat, water, pollen, seed – this project was not a thing to be finished and departed from – but became a complicated (and at times intensely challenging situation) which compelled an ongoing process of engagement, re-thinking and experiment.
Bianca Hester, Please leave these windows open overnight o enable the fans to draw in cool air during the early hours of the morning, ACCA, 2010. Photograph: Natalie Holloway (with Benjamin Woods).
As the exhibition continued, inscriptions of actions that charted bodily engagements accumulated upon the architecture such as skid marks on the floor where cyclists had ridden, blue scuff markings where a metal hoop had been rotated along the stretch of a white wall, and residues of mud and manure from a horse who entered the work now and again, gracing the situation with his earthy smell and energizing presence. The work accumulated these traces and they became a score for future action – provoking further responses that involved audiences (and other artists) to elaborate some of the work’s latent possibilities.
This project demanded being open to forces, energies, processes and challenges that were unforeseeable in advance – to occurrences that emerged within the pulse of the situation or which entered unexpectedly. In the essay Personal Support: how to care? Jan Verwoert refers to the painting by Niccolo Antonio Colantonio and Lorenzo Monaco, and discusses how Saint Jerome removes a thorn in the paw of a lion who has happened to enter into his study. Verwoert’s point is that the most poignant gesture offered by Saint Jerome is not the performance of care enacted by the thorn’s removal, but the fact that St Jerome left the door of his study open in the first place.1
Leaving a door open provokes a commitment to being responsive no matter what happens to enter and no matter how different or unsettling this may be to the plans that we fashion in advance. In committing to responding, what is affirmed is the willingness to both encounter and grapple with what enters, even if uncertain or radically unprepared.
Bianca Hester: Please leave these windows open overnight to enable the fans to draw in cool air during the early hours of the morning
6 August – 26 September 2010
Bianca Hester is an artist whose practice explores the convergences between social space, materiality and embodiment as processes in motion. She is represented by Sarah Scout, Melbourne and is currently a Post-doctoral research fellow at the Sydney College of the Arts.
1 Verwoert, Jan, “Personal Support: How to Care?” in Support Structures, Berlin: Sternberg Press, 2009, p 172.
Rewind: Contemporary art at home in the regions
David Rosetzky, Nothing like this (film still), 2007. Courtesy the artist and Sutton Gallery
By Hannah Mathews
Little known fact: most of ACCA’s staff grew up in the country! It’s not entirely clear what that says about us but it does show that the regions are growing individuals with an active interest in the contemporary arts and the ability and wherewithal to work closely with artists to support their creative and critical visions. That’s no mean feat and is certainly good news for the health of culture in a country this vast.
Since 2006 ACCA has been working with regional Victorian galleries to bring major contemporary art works, previously only seen at ACCA, to all corners of the state. Through its partnership with the Helen Macpherson Smith Trust, ACCA commissioned several ambitious and exciting new projects from artists, including Callum Morton, Rosslyn Piggott, Daniel von Sturmer, David Chesworth and Sonia Leber, which were exhibited in galleries as far-flung as Bendigo and Mildura and later gifted to these institutions.
Brendan Lee, Proving Ground, 2009. Courtesy the artist
In follow up to this program ACCA then initiated its ART (ACCA Regional Touring) program. Taking place over 2010-2011, with project funding from Arts Victoria, this program saw ACCA partner with a number of regional galleries throughout the state to develop site-specific and community-responsive exhibitions and art works. ACCA wanted to shake up the conventional practice of touring pre-packaged shows by working in conversation with a selection of galleries to devise exhibitions and programs designed specifically for each host’s space, collection interests, audience demographics and desire to grow their expertise and knowledge in presenting contemporary art.
ART#1 was the first cab of the rank and drew together three host venues in close geographical proximity to each other. ART#1 consisted of a series of purpose-created exhibitions and took place simultaneously at the Benalla Regional Gallery, Shepparton Regional Gallery and Wangaratta Art Gallery. Local audiences, tourists and supporters from Melbourne could follow a trail of art openings and events over the Easter weekend, visiting one venue after another to experience a range of contemporary work including video, photography, installation and sculpture. In Shepparton a number of artists made site-specific works that interrogated the gallery spaces while in Benalla, Brendan Lee created a major installation that commented on Australian identity and hooligan culture. In Wangaratta audiences were welcomed into a historical community hall to watch a program of new video works screened on stage.
In 2011 ACCA set its sights on Victoria’s Western District, establishing partnerships with galleries in Horsham, Hamilton and Warrnambool. This time a program was devised for each regional host and scheduled to occur throughout the year. ART#2 opened in Horsham with support from the Natimuk Brass Band who played at the exhibition opening and participated in one of several community projects initiated by the ART#2 artists. Artist Nathan Gray recalls: “I especially enjoyed getting to know the Natimuk Brass Ensemble who I worked with to create a performance titled Rural Infrasonics. For the performance I joined the band for a brief time, processing the sound of the ensemble and expanding them into an otherworldly digital cacophony. What surprised me most was how unsurprised they were. They took the whole thing in their stride as did the audiences we played to at the local footy game, farmers market and at the shops on a Saturday morning”.
Artist Gabrielle de Vietri also spent considerable time in the area, undertaking a residency in Horsham that saw her work with children to explore the pedagogical potential of games. Screened at the Natimuk Town Hall, her video was part of the opening weekend celebrations that also included Agatha Gothe-Snape’s balloon climb of the nearby Arapiles and Laresa Kosloff & Andy Thomson’s audio guide to lawn bowls at the local bowling green. Gothe-Snape’s work continued to permeate the community over the coming weeks with weekly headlines, generated in conversation with Horsham identities, appearing in the local newspaper.
As a counterpoint to the frenzied and site-specific activity of ART#2 in Horsham, the program in Hamilton offered a collection-focused and gallery orientated platform for exchange. Here artists Kate Daw and Alex Pittendrigh both spent time with the gallery’s decorative arts collection while also researching local history and landscapes. Pittendrigh undertook an open residency at the gallery where audiences could watch his innovative and knowledgeable approach to the fine art of filigree using the no-nonsense medium of Blu-take. Pittendrigh also led local students in a number of workshops, resulting in a large-scale, highly detailed relief that filled the gallery walls.
ACCA’s ART program stood alone in its activity of embedding contemporary art in regional Victoria. The series not only brought contemporary art and artists from the city to the country, it also brought contemporary art and artists from the regions into conversation with their metropolitan peers. Mentorships were developed between ACCA staff and some of the regional hosts, opportunity for new art writing was extended to young writers, audiences for contemporary art were grown just a little further.
ART#1 ACCA REGIONAL TOUR: Shepparton, Benalla and Wangaratta
17 April – 30 May 2010
Exhibiting artists: Jen Berean, Nick Devlin, Pat Foster, Shaun Gladwell, Nathan Gray, Justine Khamara, Anastasia Klose, Laresa Kosloff, Brendan Lee, David Rosetzky, Daniel von Sturmer, Darren Sylvester
ART#2 ACCA REGIONAL TOUR: Horsham
7 May – 3 July 2011
New commissions: Gabrielle de Vietri, Agatha Gothe-Snape, Nathan Gray, Helen Johnson, Laresa Kosloff & Andy Thomson
Exhibition artists: Stuart Ringholt, Nicholas Mangan, Bianca Hester, Joshua Petherick, Fiona Abicare, Benjamin Armstrong, Matthew Griffin, Damiano Bertoli, TV Moore, Laresa Kosloff, Justene Williams
ART#2 ACCA REGIONAL TOUR: Hamilton
23 July – 18 September 2011
Artists: Kate Daw, Alex Pittendrigh
Hannah Mathews is a contemporary art curator who started working with ACCA as an Associate Curator in 2008.
ACCA History
ACCA’s first location, Dallas Brooks Drive, The Domain, 1983. Courtesy ACCA Archive
This is how it all began…
In the early 80s, the need for a dedicated contemporary art space was mooted in Melbourne’s art circles for works that might not ‘easily occupy a place in the normal exhibition system’. The Cain Government got on board, an advisory committee was formed, and a 19th century gardener’s cottage alongside the Botanic Gardens was proposed as the place for the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA).
For ACCA’s first exhibition in the cottage, 3 Artists/ 3 Rooms, Melbourne artists David Larwill, Juan Davila and Howard Arkley were each given a room to paint however they wished. Press at the time called it a ‘contemporary art explosion’. Since then ACCA has launched thousands of new programs and forged ahead with a maverick spirit and a passion to promote contemporary Australian and international art and artists.
ACCA’s second location on Sturt Street, Southbank, 2002. Photographer: John Gollings
That was then, this is now… ACCA’s move to a new, expanded, purpose-built premises in Southbank arts precinct in 2002 secured its position as the leading centre for contemporary art in Australia focused on creating opportunities for artists and bringing the best international contemporary art to Melbourne audiences.
We’ve been busy. The first thirty years of ACCA’s history has been collected, collated and digitised into an online archive, launched in 2014. This digital resource features interviews with former artistic directors, artists, curators and board members, as well as visual records of past exhibitions, press clippings, invitations and more.
If you have a story to tell about ACCA, or photographs or other materials that could add to our archiving project, we’d love to hear from you… 30years@accaonline.org.au
ACCA’s First 30 Years Archive project was initiated by ACCA with support from the Perpetual Foundation. The archive team was led by Associate Curator Hannah Mathews, with Julia Powles (Archive Intern) and volunteers Klara Kelvy, Leela Schauble and Lauren Dornau. The online project was coordinated by Digital Communications Manager, Emma Sullivan, assisted by Danae Valenza and Emma Anderson.
Funded by the Rowe Family Foundation managed by Perpetual
Rewind: Tacita Dean
Tacita Dean, Kodak, 2006. Courtesy the artist, Frith Street Gallery, London and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris
By Juliana Engberg
Tacita Dean’s large survey exhibition at ACCA in 2008, including film portraits, landscape works, Berlin projects and films regarding phenomenon and film alchemy, offered Australian audiences an opportunity to update their knowledge of Tacita’s prodigious output – an interest ignited by the first survey I made with her for the Melbourne Festival in 2001.
In this first survey exhibition, we concentrated on mostly film works – Bubble House, Teighmouth Electron, Disappearance at Sea, Fernsehturm, Bag of Air, Sound Mirrors, the epic Banewl, and others. For the second, more substantial survey edition at ACCA in 2008, we presented a mix of media – prints, altered photographs, found items and film works. The 2008 survey enabled audiences to witness the expansion of Tacita’s visual language, as well as appreciate the consolidation of many of her favorite themes, including time and history, which she investigated in a number of ways and through a range of subjects.
Tacita Dean, Michael Hamburger, 2007. Courtesy the artist, Frith Street Gallery, London and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris
The exhibition included three film ‘portraits’. Michael Hamburger, a 23 minute film of the poet and translator of Sebald’s novels was a study of belonging, time, friendship and mortality presented through the metaphor of the apples grown by Hamburger, and through a sequence of very still filmic images of place – his orchard, apple barn, study – and phenomena – light, darkness and a rainbow. Tacita’s film work seemed to make a deliberate effort to slow time for her subject, whose mortality was reaching an end. Tender and private, Michael Hamburger, demonstrated Tacita’s continual interest in the intersections of history that are performed in the interpersonal.
Merce Cunningham performs STILLNESS (in three movements) to John Cage’s composition 4'33" with Trevor Carlson, New York City, 28 April 2007 (six performances; six films), 2007 was a spatial choreography of 6 films on screens in which the audience’s movement was activated in contraposition to the seated stillness performed by the renowned choreographer Merce Cunningham, who only altered his position 3 times in the slightest of ways. This collaboration between Tacita and Cunningham was both a homage to Cunninghams’ life companion, composer John Cage, and a new interpretation of his avant-garde sound classic 4’33”. STILLNESS was a double portrait of Cunningham/Cage and an investigation of time, space and content, multiplied and continuous in Tacita’s loops, acknowledging a companionship everlasting.
Tacita Dean, installation view ACCA, 2009. Courtesy ACCA Archive
Presentation Sisters – a study of an order of Nuns in Cork, Ireland, captured the daily routines and rituals of the last remaining members of this small ecclesiastical community. With a patient and gentle regard for the rhythm of the hours of the day, plotted through the ethereal light that travels through the lives and rooms of this order, Dean emphasized the aspects of quiet devotion, internal contemplation and external dedication that defined the Sisters' spiritual and earthly existence. Once more time was explored – developed through small rituals – washing, meal preparing, ironing, cleaning – silence was palpable, and light transcendent, alchemical and transformational. The arc of the day was measured by light from the brightness of the early morning to the ebb of the twilight.
These aesthetic considerations were extended in Kodak, a more abstracted vision of celluloid film passing through its processing mechanisms – filmed just before the closure of the Kodak plant in Chalon-sur-Saône, France. In this work Tacita’s keen eye for translucent colour made the mechanical magical as the film stock spooled and traveled, refracting and reflecting as it went through its last motions.
As well as these film works and several more, the survey included works on paper, altered photographs and prints. Massive photographic works of dolmens (prehistorical stones), in which Tacita erased the background with blackboard paint to release the stones so that they became a floating gestalt, continued the investigation into time, in this instance through the geological phenomenon of material compression. These works were joined by a series of her trees, similarly made iconic and dimensional through the process of background erasures.
More recently, in 2013, ACCA presented Tacita’s FILM – her major commissioned work first seen in the Tate’s Turbine Hall series. At a time when film as a medium is threatened, FILM, was conceived as an epic homage to the analogue processes of celluloid cinema. Unexpectedly turning the presentation of film into a vertical reel format, this awesomely scaled work reinvented and rescued the techniques of hand-made special effects and montage to reveal the artistry in film-making. Tacita brought our attention to the beautiful, auratic qualities and historical uses of light through film and highlighted the special effects made possible by hand tinting, manual editing, and scene-making, to produce a grand, yet detailed distillation of film and its aesthetic qualities.
In 2014 ACCA, with filmmaker, Emma Sullivan as coordinator, joined with Tacita to launch the website SAVEFILM.ORG in the hope of securing support to preserve film and its unique aesthetic language. Please click here to sign the Save Film petition and learn more about the effort to keep film viable.
Tacita Dean
6 June – 2 August 2009
Catalogue
Juliana Engberg is Artistic Director of ACCA.
Rewind: The Water Hole
Gerda Steiner & Jörg Lenzlinger: The Water Hole, installation view, ACCA, 2008. Courtesy ACCA Archive
By Kay Campbell
The Water Hole was one of those exhibitions that just took off and became an overnight hit. ACCA was inundated with families and kids over the summer holiday season, captivated by the magical world created by Swiss collaborative duo Gerda Steiner and Jörg Lenzlinger. The exhibition was the closest ACCA had come to a ‘blockbuster’, with more people than our small staff could cope with at times.
ACCA welcomed Gerda and Jörg to Melbourne for a 3-month residency to prepare their environmental installation The Water Hole in September 2008. Our project partners, Footscray Community Arts Centre, provided them with accommodation and studio space, and over many weeks they worked with members of the local community and other volunteers to create hundreds of imaginary creatures, strange ceramic eggs, fabulous trees and other paraphernalia which would eventually make their way to ACCA.
The Water Hole featured a huge new commission in ACCA’s main gallery that took the visitor through a fabulous grotto. There were many other earlier works also presented in the smaller galleries, including videos, mobiles, a hanging bed, a suspended meteor and a tear desalination experiment.
Gerda Steiner & Jörg Lenzlinger: The Water Hole, installation view, ACCA, 2008. Courtesy ACCA Archive
At the heart of Gerda and Jörg’s practice lies a serious concern for the environment. Using discarded things – broken toilets, obsolete mobile phones and plastics brought together with a forest of trees, self made crystals, invented creatures made from thrown away items – they created a fantasy world. The Water Hole was a three dimensional, experiential place in which the organic and inorganic performed a symbiosis of invention and exuberance.
Children and adults alike were drawn to The Water Hole, as if discovering a fantastic fictional place. People lay on the therapeutic bed whilst a meteor swung over their heads, or on a swinging bed under a magical chandelier of twigs and bits and pieces. They wandered around exploring a kaleidoscope of caves, water and crystals; peered into microscopes to see the tiny world held in a tear drop; climbed to a look-out to observe other visitors exploring the grotto; and moved along the silver, shimmering tunnel that sounded like rain. All the while a tiny drip of water was released into the golden pond-bed, which over the season, dried and cracked in sympathy with one of Victoria’s most prolonged droughts.
During those hot summer holidays, the ACCA education team created a treasure hunt to encourage kids to notice the details and share the experience with their parents and grandparents. In February we were overwhelmed with school groups. Until that time ACCA’s education program had focused predominantly on secondary and tertiary students, but the overwhelming response of young children inspired us to devise ACCA’s renowned philosophy of art for kids sessions known as MAKE. I still find it exciting watching young participants in this popular program curiously grappling in quite sophisticated ways with some of the bigger questions that art throws at us.
Gerda Steiner & Jörg Lenzlinger: The Water Hole
23 December 2008 – 1 March 2009
Kay Campbell is the Executive Director of the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art.
Built for video
Richard Billingham: People, Places, Animals, installation view, ACCA, 2007. Courtesy ACCA Archive
By Lauren Dornau
In 2002 ACCA moved to the new Wood Marsh-designed building on Sturt Street, Southbank. In comparison to ACCAs old home in Dallas Brooks Drive, which had low ceilings and small modestly proportioned rooms, the new ACCA’s design, with its expansive spaces, high ceilings and multiple rooms delivered a version of the European kunsthalle or ‘exhibition hall’ which was ideal for exhibiting contemporary art.
Coinciding with ACCA’s change of space and status, video art emerged as a force in contemporary visual arts. ACCA’s new accommodations were poised to receive moving image work as it asserted its prominence as a media. The new ACCA was ideal for moving image and video works; large expanses of wall uninterrupted by window or door openings or decorative trimmings created a blank canvas for projected media.
Since its origins in the early 1960s, from works using small television sets to large digital projections, experimental to documentary, single channel to interactive installations video art has come a long way. ACCA has been the lead gallery in Melbourne to embrace and nurture video art as a contemporary art medium.
Over the past 12 years ACCA’s main exhibition gallery has been used for both solo and group shows and its proportions have proved perfect for large video works such as Shirin Neshat’s dual screen ‘Turbulent’ (2004), and Callum Morton, Marco Fusinato and Mutlu Cerkez’s collaborative work Avalon for the group exhibition ‘The Unquiet World’ (2006). The stark, enclosed architecture of the interior spaces has suited shows like Richard Billingham’s ‘People, Places and Animals’ which dealt with issues of hostility, discomfort and captivity. The combination of smaller and larger gallery spaces has worked well for major surveys of artist’s works where often a new commission is supported by several older key video works, for example; Pipilotti Rist’s ‘I Packed the Postcard In My Suitcase’, as well as group exhibitions such as ‘Cinema Paradiso’ (2007) and ‘Gestures and Procedures’ (2010) which showcased multiple film and photographic works.
In addition to this a larger gallery space has provided an opportunity for the projected work to be positioned in different locations; adjacent or on walls so the audience can sit, relax and soak in the work or as a sculptural object of it’s own that can be experienced physically and/or physiologically. In David Rosetzky’s ‘How to Feel’ bean bags were set up in front of the screen and invited the viewer to become part of the studio-based therapy/exercise workshop featured in the work. Tacita Dean’s ‘Film’ was projected onto a monolith or ‘mountain’ of a wall mimicking the mountains depicted in the film. Douglas Gordon’s island of TV monitors as part of ‘The only way out is the only way in’ (2014) resembled a floating island of electronic refuse. In ‘Gestures and Procedures’ many of the artists’ works were installed in separate rooms that invited the audience to participate in their personal experiences and interpretations
Lauren Dornau completed a Bachelor of Architecture from RMIT University and currently interns at ACCA.
Rewind: Gillian Wearing
Gillian Wearing, Self-portrait, 2000. Courtesy of the artist, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York, and Maureen Paley, London
By Kay Campbell
I was particularly excited when Juliana started talking to Gillian Wearing about doing a show at ACCA. I’d been captivated from my first encounter of her work while I was living in the UK – its tough and tender portrayal of the precariousness of the human condition was compelling and unique. Quite different in spirit from that of most of the so-called YBAs with whom Gillian was associated and also unlike any practice in Australia at that time.
At Saatchi’s notorious Sensation exhibition in London in 1997 I was struck by Gillian’s 10-16 installed in a side room where it emitted a raw vulnerable humanity that differentiated it from the slick works in the main hall. In this series of videos the words of 7 troubled children aged between 10 and 16 are lip-synched by oddly matched adults in mundane settings. Each narrative is a painful snapshot of a moment in an individual life, but their juxtaposition and sequence make a fascinating, complex and disturbing study of the loss of innocence, the development from childhood to adulthood, and the tension between the internal voice and the external facade. These are enduring themes in Gillian’s work.
The exhibition at ACCA took a couple of years to realize, and the result, opening in October 2005, lived up to all my expectations. This first for Australian audiences provided a rare opportunity to see the depth and range of Gillian’s work and was the largest show that she had presented. The exhibition filled the whole space and featured most of her photo and video works including 10-16, the already iconic Signs that say what you want them to say and not Signs that say what someone else wants you to say, the notorious Drunk, the Family Album series and many more.
Gillian Wearing, 2 into 1, 1997. Courtesy of the artist, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York, and Maureen Paley, London
The first work encountered at the entrance to the exhibition was an arresting self-portrait of Gillian in an emerald green jumper. From a distance its stiff blocky-ness suggested a naive painting; close up it became apparent that it was a photograph of the real Gillian inside a prosthetic of herself, with only her eyes appearing through the mask. This simple gesture immediately questioned the authenticity of photography, and the nature of self – as public and private, as artist and object.
On entering the main gallery, the viewer encountered the entire family album spread out across the back wall – brother and sister, parents, grandparents, an uncle. The eyes of Gillian appeared through each mask, spookily binding the family together, while simultaneously detaching herself. The self-portrait as a young child was particularly arresting – the knowing eyes of the adult Gillian showing through the innocent, sad and serious little face of her 3 year old self.
Within the gallery a series of claustrophobic box like spaces were constructed to house the moving image works Confess all on Video, Trauma and 2 into 1, heightening their psychological intensity. My favourite, 2 into 1, was devastating. Once again the concept is very simple – twin 11 year old boys are asked to talk about their mother and she about them. Each then lip-synchs the words of the other. This revealing portrait of motherhood and the emergence of adolescence was fascinating and became excruciating at times, particularly as it caught the mother concurrently registering the often cruel words of her beloved boys as she mimes.
Gillian Wearing, Self-Portrait at 17 Years Old, 2003, Courtesy of the artist, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York, and Maureen Paley, London
There were many other highlights, from the tender and harsh Theresa series, to the surprisingly optimistic I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing. As always Juliana’s installation took the visitor on a physical and mental journey, which compelled them to move from one work to the next and then loop back on themselves. The last work, on the other side of the wall to Gillian’s self-portrait, was a tiny poignant portrait of her frail grandmother Nancy Gregory slumped in a wheelchair. There was no mask here, instead her face was hidden by a sun-hat and she remained internalized as the life ebbed out of her, silent except for the occasional soft chirruping of birds.
Kay Campbell has been Executive Director of ACCA since 2002.
Rewind: Out and About: ACCA At Large, Part 2
Jane Rhodes
Nick Mangan, Untitled, 2010. The Big Wall Project. Courtesy the artist and ACCA Archive
The Big Wall Project, Things that Go Bump In the Night, and other artists
The Big Wall Project was an off site commission curated by the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art for the Crown Metropol Hotel, and ran from August 2010 to July 2012.
Spanning long and high The Big Wall Project was one of the largest locations for viewing contemporary public art in Melbourne at over 18 metres long and nearly 6 metres high. Geelong born and Melbourne based Nick Mangan created a huge collage of images on a giant swath of cloth. The wall was rendered into an immersive landscape mural of giant hands in colour tones of majestic purple, fleshy pinks and shades of grey.
Nathan Coley, Heaven Is A Place Where Nothing Ever Happens, installation view, ACCA, 2010. Courtesy ACCA Archive
Nathan Coley: Heaven is a Place Where Nothing Ever Happens
Scottish artist and Turner prize nominee, Nathan Coley erected his famous message sculpture Heaven Is A Place Where Nothing Ever Happens on the ACCA Forecourt in 2010.
The work consisted of 480 light globes mounted as letters on an aluminum frame. The origin of this eponymous text was a Talking Heads pop song, but this may not be well known by all passers-by. In this sense Coley wanted to question the viewers’ contemplation of the work. He said that ‘its strength is its ambiguity – is heaven a place where nothing ever happens? For some it’s a comforting message that this promise of the afterlife is without incident. Others may wonder if heaven is the place they were told it would be”.
Things that Go Bump In the Night: Laresa Kosloff, Sonia Leber and David Chesworth
Things that Go Bump In the Night consisted of two artist projects curated by ACCA for the City Square to support the City of Melbourne’s Late Night Programming initiative — to encourage discovery and delight in those who passed through this public domain at all times during the day and night.
Sonia Leber and David Chesworth’s We, The Masters captured the inventive and at times hilarious things we say to our pets. The artists used raw material from everyday life — parks, veterinary practices, animal training schools, farms and zoos — to capture the highly personal way people talk to their animals. We, The Masters captured the various tones, melodies and patterns of speech used by owners when communicating with their pets, often formed through repetition and habit. With the sounds of the animals edited out, the voices, which came from discretely placed speakers placed high in the existing street trees, appeared to be calling out directly, and commanding, cajoling and encouraging, the passerby.
Laresa Kosloff, Office Skate, captured people undertaking work and leisure activities within the built environment. Kosloff’s Super 8 footage of controlled office environments were digitally montaged with freer activities such as ice-skating and ‘Parkour’, and were projected onto the walls of the City Square to blur the barriers between recreation and bureaucracy.
Torsten Lauschmann: At the heart of everything a row of holes
Jacqueline Donachie, Melbourne Slow Down (2013). Courtesy the artist. Photograph: Jen Moore
At the heart of everything a row of holes was a one-night-only special event of two performances to coincide with the Melbourne Art Fair in 2012. The National Theatre, in Carlisle Street St Kilda, was the venue for this video meets cabaret and vaudeville event. It was invented by Glasgow based, German artist Torsten Lauschmann who used every surface of the theatre in this surround-sound spectacle. Lauschmann drew the audience into an immersive, strange world of visual and sound effects that created a spellbinding atmosphere.
Desire Lines Performance events: Dan Shipsides, Mel O’Callaghan and Jacqueline Donachie
ACCA’s 2012-2013 summer exhibition Desire Lines referred to the wayward, improvised tracks created by walkers and others who defy the ways urban regulators and councils design routes for them.
British artist, Dan Shipsides, created one of his renowned climbing based artworks on the exterior of the ACCA building. By mapping his path with white rope adhered to ACCA with magnets, Shipsides created a unique and ephemeral line drawing.
Sydney born and Paris based artist, Mel O’Callaghan, created a moving sculpture of rocks on ACCA’s forecourt. Inspired by Richard Long’s environmental object formations, O’Callaghan’s performance involved a dedicated team of performers moving a rock wall, stone by stone across the forecourt of ACCA — a sculpture in motion.
Scottish artist, Jacqueline Donachie and her bike riding teams created colourful chalk line drawings from the edges of the city to ACCA. This special event — the coda to Desire Lines — was a happening devised by Donachie and 100 keen ACCA volunteers.
ACCA at Large, Part 1
Rewind: Mike Nelson: Lonely Planet
Mike Nelson, Lonely Planet, installation view, ACCA, 2006. Courtesy ACCA Archive
By Rebecca Coates
Mike Nelson’s vast and ambitious, immersive installation, Lonely Planet opened to the public on 21 December 2006. Nelson created a labyrinthine series of corridors and rooms, complete with sounds, still images, and olfactory assaults throughout ACCA’s gallery spaces. His proposal for the project incorporated radical ideas about how visitors should enter this complex space. Original thoughts included an un-realizable proposal to cut a small discreet entrance directly into the building’s exterior cortene-steel wall. Another was to bring visitors through the gallery’s cavity wall, stepping over and between an impossible maze of struts and other spatial obstacles – a little like ACCA’s own version of Alice through the Looking Glass.
Nelson’s final solution forced visitors to decide their own route, having to choose from two adjacent identical doors in order to gain entry to the spaces beyond. A small, found, black and white photograph attached to the wall offered a possible clue, timelessly capturing a group of golden youths, board-short and bikini clad, with surfboards on a beach in some unidentifiable tropical spot.
Nelson’s work often examines the idea of ‘otherness’, and allusions to something lost or past. These themes are explored via images, language and material. The Coral Reef (2000), presented in Matt’s Gallery, London (for which he was shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 2001), was evocative in its absences as much as in its rooms and narratives. The traces of a fictional biker gang, the Amnesiacs, littered the space, while one room seemed to be the headquarters for a London mini-cab taxi company employing immigrants, possibly Turkish, and likely to be under the radar and off the books. These literary and other traces alluded to complex histories that included postcolonial references, Islam, and geographies beyond the West.
Mike Nelson, Lonely Planet, installation view, ACCA, 2006. Courtesy ACCA Archive
Lonely Planet at ACCA was equally evocative in its absences. Corrugated iron, weather-board, an old work bench and tools, a particular shade of institutional green paint: for some, these spaces were redolent of rural sheds and vernacular architecture. For others, the installation conjured up thoughts of government buildings of the ’50s and certain, not always pleasant, institutional rooms. An old station-wagon with wetsuit and lines of ants on the move, a discarded sleeping bag, empty beer cans – the implications were not always clear.
Lonely Planet’s allusions to youth, drug cultures, and Australia’s own cult of surf and sand also pointed to hard-line conservative Thatcherite England, where the best way to escape (Lonely Planet travel guide in hand) was via cheap travel and the lure of the exotic, the oblivion of hashish, or the sci-fi literature and psychedelia of an altogether otherworldly kind. These utopian exoticas were spaces that existed outside the laws and customs of democratic societies, governed by subcultures with their own specific rules.
Mike Nelson, Lonely Planet, installation view, ACCA, 2006. Courtesy ACCA ArchiveRedundant technology has been a constant refrain in many of Nelson’s immersive installations. Technology and literature are a source of inspiration, and a means through which to present the work. Nelson spent a six-week period prior to installation travelling country Victorian roads, documenting and photographing vernacular architecture, subcultures, and aspects of an often forgotten historic and rural past. These images were shown as a series of slide-projections washing the gallery walls, visible through windows in certain built rooms. The clack-clack of the projectors added an acoustic element from a by-gone era of analogue instruction and holiday slide shows. The slides were reproduced in the exhibition catalogue, a sort of artist’s book cross-pollenated with one of those obscure technical brochures Nelson loves. Reproduced in a grid within their slide mounts, these images captured hot-rod cars – souped-up Toranas and Valiants featuring the wonders of the panel-beaters’ craft – alongside abandoned folk images of service stations, used car tyre mountains, or temporary bush shelters of a possibly sinister type.
The exhibition allowed Nelson to work in a new way. Instead of his usual meticulous on-site build, which often took from six weeks to several months, we had an opportunity to pre-build in the Malthouse Theatre’s nearby store (now the VCA Secondary College). This meant that all of the sourcing of second-hand material and much of the pre-build took place prior to install. A small crew worked on this pre-build and the installation, including Ned Needham as chief assistant, the ACCA install crew, and a number of RMIT sculpture students. This opportunity allowed students to work alongside Nelson, gaining first-hand experience of his working process and methods.
A lecture given by Nelson at RMIT was a packed, standing-room only event. And in the end, we were not unhappy with the fact that though Lonely Planet Publications (whose home-town is in fact Melbourne) didn’t go so far as to officially condone the use of their trademark name, their very silence may well have been a form of tacit approval for a project that celebrated some of the founding principles of those once hippy, alternative travel guides first written in the 1970s.
Mike Nelson: Lonely Planet
19 December – 25 February 2007
Rebecca Coates initiated the Mike Nelson exhibition and was its curator. She worked at ACCA as a curator from 2002-2007 and was appointed an Associate Curator in 2007.
Rewind: Ambitious Thinking: the Helen Macpherson Smith Commissions at ACCA
Callum Morton: Babylonia, installation view, ACCA, 2005. Courtesy ACCA Archive
By Charlotte Day
My first arts job was as front of house/gallery assistant at ACCA; the year was 1994 and the job advertised was the Secretary. I still remember the feeling of dread when confronted on my first day with the not-so-old teal blue IBM typewriter and thinking ‘sh…, I don’t even know how to turn the blasted thing on…’ Aside from this shaky start, I have fond memories of my early time at ACCA where, as an inexperienced recent graduate, I felt warmly welcomed and encouraged to learn fast! ACCA’s program was ambitious, outward looking and internationally engaged. The bar was set high to present exhibitions and events that were important and relevant.
Wind forward ten years to when Juliana Engberg invited me to help with ACCA’s program for Melbourne Festival; I returned to an organisation housed in a building that much better matched its aspirations. The Helen MacPherson Smith commissions, which I worked on over a period of six years (1), perfectly exemplify the important role ACCA has played: encouraging and also crucially supporting artists (with substantial financial and curatorial back-up) to think and make work of ambition in both scale and concept.
The Helen Macpherson Smith Commission emerged out of a visionary multi-year partnership driven by Liz Gillies of the Helen Macpherson Smith Trust and Kay Campbell of ACCA. The Trust wanted to help the new ACCA establish a substantial opportunity for artists as well as achieving public benefits. The idea of a generous annual commission for a Victorian artist which would manifest in ACCA’s large gallery space, with an associated work later gifted to a regional gallery came out of the Trust’s special interest in regional Victoria. This unusual twist empowered regional galleries to collect some important contemporary works and in some cases, where space allowed, resulted in the restaging of the commissions themselves in places like Mildura and Ballarat.
Daniel von Sturmer: The Field Equation, installation view, ACCA, 2006. Courtesy ACCA Archive
As Artistic Director, Juliana Engberg developed the concept, commissioned each of the 6 artists and worked with them to establish the scope of the project. My role was to bring the projects to fruition with the artist. These were exciting and heady times in art and exhibition making! Each project had many moments in which we questioned whether we could actually make it happen. Would it work? What I really liked about working at ACCA on these and other projects was the organization’s willingness to embrace such challenges. But I am getting ahead of myself, because, in the first instance, each Helen Macpherson Smith Commission recipient had to confront the reality of a big problem, the elephant in the room so to speak: how to deal with ACCA’s monumental gallery space? It’s just not something that you can ignore…
In his determined way, the first recipient, Callum Morton deftly confronted one architecture with another with his rocky, inwardly focused Babylonia, functioning like the mummy inside the tomb. In contrast, Daniel von Sturmer broke down the space into smaller units, a field of 100 white plinths on top of which he posited his experiments with objects and videos. Sonia Leber and David Chesworth returned to the idea of inserting one architecture into another with a Panopticon structure, which opened up to a soundscape elevating the upper strata of the gallery with heavenly voices. David Noonan softened the acoustics and evoked a 1960s casual living or performance space with a wall-to-wall sisal rug backdrop to his screen-printed collages of experimental theatre projects.
Rosslynd Piggott elected to forgo ACCA’s largest space for the sequential three side galleries to present her elegant and delicate slow reveal installation of film and mirrored surfaces. Finally, Bianca Hester’s interest in spatial practice led her back to the large gallery space to re-construct a human-scaled arena of concrete blocks, soil, timber screens and props ready for open and unregulated forms of movement and play.
I don’t think its an overstatement to say that these kinds of commissions can be game-changers for the artists who take them on and this has certainly been the case for many of the Helen Macpherson Smith commissions. They have also had a profound effect on all of us who worked on them, for ACCA, and I hope for the audiences who experienced them too.
David Noonan: Scenes, installation view, ACCA, 2009. Courtesy ACCA Archive
Bianca Hester, installation view, ACCA, 2010. Courtesy the artist and the ACCA Archive
Also this year
Bill Viola, The Raft, 2004, production still, courtesy the artist. photo: Kira Perov
21st century Art in the first decade, catalogue, Qld art gallery / Gallery of Modern Art
19 October, The Age, An erudite, disorienting interrogation of art’s process, David Chesworth @ MIAF
The Age, Terrorist art, David Chesworth @ MIAF
20 October, The Age, Aesthetic swamped by arty farce, Bill Viola @ MIAF
Public Programs, Education and Events
Lucy Gunning, Climbing Around My Room 1993(video still). Exhibited at ACCA in Gestures & Procedures 2010. Courtesy the artist.
Following on from the success of earlier tours, ACCA once again took a group of art lovers to the Biennale of Sydney for the third consecutive time. The weekend included an intensive guided tour of Biennale highlights and other art destinations in Sydney. In July ACCA also took a small, guided tour to the Venice Architecture Biennale.
With the appointment of new staff in ACCA’s education area there was considerable growth in primary education and public programs. This included new program initiatives specifically for primary schools and expanded public programs activity including the Wednesday evenings talks series. For primary school students ACCA offered two free and newly tailored programs: MAKE an artist-guided practical art making workshop using contemporary materials, and THINK which involved fun philosophical collaborative discussions about contemporary art.
‘Look Who’s Talking’ and ‘In Conversation’ evenings
ACCA’s popular “Look Who’s Talking’ program continued with free Wednesday evening and Sunday afternoon talks by artists, curators and social commentators linked to the exhibition program. A special ‘in conversation’ evening event coincided with each season, with ACCA’s Artistic Director and curators talking with exhibiting artists about their work.
Thematic talks and walks
ACCA also programmed a wide range of talks and activities to complement exhibition content. These include a night-time tour of Melbourne General Cemetery to coincide with Mortality as well as a panel discussion at the Melbourne Town Hall investigating theoretical and artistic concepts of heaven. Another panel discussion included psychiatric and theatrical responses to Gestures and Procedures, featuring Dr. Edwin Harari.
ACCA Art Tours
Following on from the success of earlier tours, ACCA once again took a group of art lovers to the Sydney Biennale, for the third consecutive time. The weekend included an intensive guided tour of biennale highlights and other art destinations in Sydney. In July ACCA also took a guided tour to the Venice Architecture Biennale.
Multicultural Art Program (MAP)
ACCA’s specially devised series of workshops for recently arrived young people from a variety of cultural backgrounds, including refugees, took place in February and December. 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.
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.
Education
In 2010 ACCA’s Education Services delivered five integrated streams of experience:
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. ACCA Digital Delivery
ACCA produced digital resources for students and teachers to compliment each exhibition season. The downloadable online digital resources broaden both student and teacher knowledge of contemporary art through sound file interviews with artist and a range of art professionals.
4. Infocube
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.
5. 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.
PROGRAM DETAILS
In Conversation – Juliana Engberg in conversation with curator Hannah Mathews, artists; Lou Hubbard and Alicia Frankovich and exhibition design collaborator; Sonia Simpfendorfer
16 March 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW010.
In Conversation – Juliana Engberg and Vogue Living editor; David Clark in conversation with curator Hannah Mathews, artists Lou Hubbard and Susan Jacobs, and collaborators Sonia Simpfendorfer and Danielle Midalia
22 April 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition NEW010.
Keynote Lecture – Dr Carolyn Barnes
9 June 2010
Dr Carolyn Barnes addressed the art practice of Peter Cripps, providing an historical overview of his groundbreaking practice of minimal-conceptualism. Held in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution.
In Conversation – Peter Cripps and Peter Tyndall, artists
16 June 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution.
In Conversation – Sue Cramer in conversation with artist Peter Cripps
30 June 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution.
Talk – Mirror, Mirror on the wall; Masato Takasaka, artist
11 July 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution.
In Conversation – Rebecca Coates in conversation with artist Peter Cripps
14 July 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution.
Talk – Artist-Curator, Curator-Artist
18 July 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution the directors of Y3K gallery and Rebecca Coates discuss the fundamental difference between artist and curator.
Forum – Bauhaus in the middle of the street: minimalism in design today
24 July 2010
Susie Attiwill, Norbert Loeffler, Warren Taylor, and Shane Murray discuss minimalism in design today in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution.
Talk – Lessness; Dr Justin Clemens, Art Critic
25 July 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Towards An Elegant Solution.
In Conversation – Bianca Hester, artist and Juliana Engberg, Artistic Director
9 August 2010
Held in conjunction with the private viewing of Bianca Hester’s Please leave these windows open overnight to enable the fans to draw in cool air during the early hours of the morning.
Talk – Anastasia Klose and Tony Schwensen, artist
11 August 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Gestures & Procedures.
Talk – Lucy Gunning, artist
25 August 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Gestures & Procedures.
Talk – Mike Parr, artist
8 September 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Gestures & Procedures.
In Conversation – Bianca Hester and Spiros Panigirakis, artist and collaborator
15 September 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Please leave these windows open overnight to enable the fans to draw in cool air during the early hours of the morning.
Talk – Three Responses to the Exhibitions
22 September 2010
Series of three talks given by Juliana Engberg, Artistic Director, Dr Edwin Harari; Senior Consultant Psychiatrist, and Sean Cubitt; Professor of Media and Communications, held in conjunction with Bianca Hester and Gestures & Procedures.
Forum – Nathan Coley, artist
27 September 2010
Artist, Nathan Coley, spoke about his public art program Heaven Is A Place Where Nothing Ever Happens, joined by a panel of speakers, responding to the question ‘is heaven in the hereafter or the here and now?’
Venue: Supper Room, Melbourne Town Hall
Talk – Catherine Deveny, serial pest
13 October 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Heaven Is A Place Where Nothing Ever Happens.
Talk – Robert Buckingham, creative founder Melbourne Fashion Festival
10 November 2010
Held in conjunction with the exhibition Heaven Is A Place Where Nothing Ever Happens.
