Front Beach Back Beach Public Art Project - Individual Curation
Version 2 2024-06-02, 23:40
Version 1 2023-08-24, 05:06
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posted on 2024-06-02, 23:40 authored by Cameron BishopCameron BishopFront Beach Back Beach Public Art Project - Individual Curation
History
Location
Coolart Homestead and Wetlands, Somers (Shone); Rosebud Pier and Foreshore (McGrath); Point Nepean National Park (Breckon and Randall and James Guerts)Language
engNotes
https://fbbb.com.au/ FBBB has identified fifteen locations/contexts across 723 square kilometres that create a unique set of conditions for artistic response. The scattered-site event will feature the work of eighteen local and national artists/collectives responding to hidden and overlooked histories of national significance that channel our collective past and future. With a strong focus on creating new opportunities for community engagement, artists will work with targeted community groups and demographics in multiple ways, including research, co-production, participation and performance. The stories begin with the landscape, and Traditional Owners, thousands of years ago, when Monmar became a sacred women’s place used for birthing, ceremony and initiation. William Buckley’s escape from the first official European settlement in 1802 is a tale of first contact, and survival, while few people realise that the location of the first shots fired in both World Wars was from Point Nepean (Monmar). National myths, conspiracy and modern political history were further shaped at Monmar, at Cheviot Beach, the site of Harold Holt’s disappearance in 1969, while other sites at Coolart Wetlands, Mt Martha Cove, Wonga (Arthurs Seat), Rosebud foreshore and Flinders pier and paragliding ramp, offer artists, performers and audiences the opportunity to explore the Peninsula from multiple perspectives - cultural, environmental, political, class, and gender. FBBB employs experimental creative practices as a conduit for local, regional and national audiences to learn more about the past, and at the same time reflect and act on issues that will impact on future generations like climate change, sustainable land-use, public health, and our relations with each other. Artists have developed responses that are playful, reflective, critical, subtle and perhaps sublime but all focused on a unique and potentially overlooked aspect of place. FBBB is part road trip, part curatorial experiment and part exploration of how contemporary art in the public sphere can offer new and unique understandings of people, locale and time. A journey that firmly rewards the intrepid, FBBB encompasses the expanse of the Peninsula with all works reachable by car and accessible by foot. Guided by an in-depth directional app, you’ll unearth both its secrets and new takes on what is right in front of you. While for some Front Beach Back Beach might be a trip down memory lane to popular Peninsula landmarks, for others, this journey will offer compelling insights into a region that has dramatically shaped Australian identities and mythologies. The fifteen site-specific events will unfold across the Peninsula in November 2022 and will be documented for an exhibition at the MPRG over summer.Extent
Website: https://fbbb.com.au/ 1 PDF projects summary and media doc 3 x MP4 films: Amanda Shone's sculptural installation and performance work; and Breckon and Randall's Film InstallationEditor/Contributor(s)
Cross D, Lacy D, Reis S, Morley RStart date
2022-11-04End date
2022-11-27Research statement
Background Sitting underneath the broader event conception, this portfolio includes the curation of 3 individual commissions + 1 co-curation. Each commission took place across a different location on the Mornington Peninsula and sought to investigate how artist and site selection might be entwined with history and context to produce a complex and transformatory temporary public artwork. Operating in a field of research devoted to place-based curation, specifically its capacity to critically investigate history, narratives and the building of community resilience, these commissions sought to investigate and implement best practice in artist/curator research. Contribution 5 leading Australian artists (producing 4 commissions) were invited by the curator to respond to a framing premise predicated on researching key stories and sites of post-colonial Mornington Peninsula/ Bunurong land. Embodying an innovative method that asked artists to respond specifically to event, site and object, each commission was unique and innovative, seeking to elide artistic intervention with broader discourses of environment, history, colonialism, geography, and environs straddling diverse subject areas (Somers Migrant Camp, the disappearance of Harold Holt, the Foreshore camping grounds, and the rip at Port Phillip heads). Significance FBBB was commissioned by leading Victorian Art space Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery and supported with a substantial RISE grant together with MP council funding and private patronage support (RACV). The forthcoming FBBB book published by MPRG includes essays by Australian scholars including Prof Jacqueline Milner, Andrew Atchison and Antonia Pont. Critical responses to the series included 'FBBB will go down in history' Professor Peter Hill and 'Brilliant project' ACCA Director Max Delany. Leading Australian performers Sigrid Thornton and Sammy J contributed to the narrative voice overs and substantial media coverage took place across ABC and RRR.Event
Mornington Peninsula Shire at public sites spread over 720 square kms. These were four projects of a total of 15 that Cross and Bishop originally devised.Publisher
Mornington Peninsula Regional GalleryPlace of publication
Mornington Peninsula, Vic.Usage metrics
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