Background
Front Beach Back Beach (FBBB) is a curatorial research project co-developed by Cameron Bishop, David Cross and Danny Lacy from Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery. Featuring 15 new temporary public art commissions by over 30 leading Australian artists (including Maree Clarke, Lisa Waup and Breckon and Randle), the project investigates how a community and history focused curatorial frame might serve to build new approaches by artists to the creation of temporary public art works. The research also examines how a large multi-sited public art event can be devised to incorporate different artistic media while attaining a coherent experience for art audiences.
Contribution
FBBB as a curatorial research project with extensive outputs, is the first large-scale, multi-sited temporary public art project ever developed for the Mornington Peninsula. Specifically, it is the first curated project of its kind that positions community engagement, historical research about key events and place responsiveness as underlying foci. FBBB offers new knowledge and innovative ideas in the creation of a public art curatorial frame while also offering innovative thinking in the growing area of creative event user experience. Featuring 15 large-scale works across a 723 square kilometre region, FBBB also provides a new model for creative tourism.
Significance
FBBB has provided a new model for curatorial research and research consortia building and specifically one that has demonstrated income and output success across both TRO and NTRO and external income generation. With audience figures in the tens of thousands. the participation of more than 30 leading Australian artists, multiple curatorial outputs, a pending book of the project together with future journal articles and conference papers, FBBB could be seen as an industry-leading research project. To secure close to $500k in category 2-4 funding (the prestigious Rise fund) and to be selected to partner on the project by MPRG demonstrates the projects esteem.
Publication classification
JC2 Curated Exhibition or Event – Exhibition/Event
Scale
NTRO Major
Extent
I major curatorial output, 6 additional NTRO curatorial outputs (3 Bishop, 3 Cross), category 2-4 income, 5 NTRO (written outputs).