Samara McIlroy | Art blog

Glowstick love

Fri, 18 May 2012 08:37:14 +1000

Currently at INFLIGHT ARI, Hobart.

Engagement: a dialogue.
Samara McIlroy, Exhibition runs: May 5 – 26  Engagement: a dialogue is a project in which the artist will attempt to initiate an exchange between socially-engaged artists in Hobart and the international arts community. The exchange was intended to take place at the 2012 Open Engagement Conference in Portland Oregon, but the artist was unsuccessful in her attempts to attract funding to attend, nor interest from the organisers towards her project.

In a desperate last-ditch effort to entice the conference participants to pay her some attention, Samara McIlroy will use the Paddy Lyn Memorial space at Inflight as the new headquarters for her continuing attempts at initiating dialogue.

ISM | BREATH | SHE | WHO | WITH | I

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 15:58:49 +1000

“Creativity is not a talent, it is a way of operating" John Cleese (lecture on YouTube)

Even when I am really, really busy, I try to see as much art as I possibly can. I think it is important to stay informed and allow myself to be inspired by artists whose practice I admire. I also love to support my fellow artists, and showing up to their openings seems a good way to do that.

On 2nd MARCH, four new shows opened at Sawtooth in Launceston. Keen to check out this relatively new ARI (to see if I should apply in the next round), but with limited time available, I drove up after work on Friday with the delightful Karin Chan. We got back to Hobart at about 11 o’clock that night. For Hobartians, the act of driving up to Launnie and back in an evening is considered pretty remarkable, so I racked up a few good karma points for my efforts. I went to see and support Rahni Allen and Pip Stafford and their collaborative efforts IN SEARCH OF SPACE, which put me in mind of lime and blue heaven spiders...but that’s another story.

I was surprised (and pleased) to see Nancy Mauro-Flude’s ism | breath | she | who | with | I in the New Media Gallery space (image above courtesy of the artist). This was really mesmerising, powerful stuff. In this work, Mauro-Flude “divines classic texts, reconfigur[ing] it into lists, a literary pirate she reveals its treasure. Using command tools (cat, sed, grep, regex) from GNU/Linux community, in this particular work the artist parses through the essay 'A Room of One's Own' by Virginia Woolf, the semiotic analysis transfigures the work into its essence. Woolf’s essay, a cogent masterpiece, sharply references the writer's experience and the place of women characters in the University, in fiction and in society per se.”

In a darkened room, Mauro-Flude’s command line code operates constantly - it is the sound of busywork. The tapping keyboard evokes the throwing of bones or i-ching coins. Coupled with the images - multiple projections of obsessive yet poetic word-lists and flickering code resembling flames - the work is truly immersive and mesmeric (I often think the term ‘immersive’ is SO overused, but fits in this case). Thinking of this work again (and I am writing this post seven weeks later) produces an image in my mind (perhaps just a ten-second loop) of postfeminist woman weeping in anger and grinding her teeth in frustration over her keyboard, tap-tap-tapping into the night.

I don’t think the work got much pre-press, and I’m not sure how many people went to see it, but it affected me so much that I wanted to immediately go home and read some Virginia Woolf. At that point I hadn’t read any of her books. Truly shocking given my feminist-hippie-greenie upbringing. Now I can safely say (in case I’m ever asked) yes, I have read Virginia Woolf.

On 19th APRIL, I passed (ever-so-briefly) through Melbourne on my way back to Hobart. I was able to make it to the opening of Bellowing Echoes. Curated by Marcel Cooper and Bronwyn Bailey-Charteris, this exhibition was part of the Next Wave Festival. The opening at Gertrude Contemporary Art Space was chock-full of inner-city-arty hipsters. But also, thankfully, some really, really good art.

I was ‘specially keen to see the work of Slow Art Collective and Makeshift, because Chaco Kato (Slow Art Collective) and Karl Khoe (Makeshift) are two of the artists involved with the (f)route project. I am pleased to say that I really liked both the Slow Art Collective’s ‘designer pan-asian’ installation (Double Happiness B&B, 2012) and Makeshift’s Land-escape 1 & 2, 2011 (which utilised found materials - am I allowed to mention Steampunk?) Also worth mentioning is Anna Kristensen’s Indian Chamber, 2011 - a detailed painting of the Jenolan Caves covering the inside of a curved plywood wall. The viewer can walk into the circular space and close the door, becoming completely encircled by the work. On the opening night it felt quite claustrophobic, but peaceful. The babbling crowd was kept outside, while only a few of us shared the relatively spacious chamber. Worth a look, this show is on until the 26th May.

PASSION(f)route Portable Community Museum

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 09:12:13 +1100

The (f)route project, a funded artist residency in far East Gippsland (Tubbut to be exact), has begun. A two-parter, it kicked off with a Pop Up in February.

Here is the original proposal:
Create a pop-up community museum about
local fruit with (f)route artist-in residence
Samara McIlroy.

Come at 3pm
with your home-grown fruit, recipes,
preserves or jams and then create
labels for them. Together, we'll
create a conversational space and
beautiful display, and at the end of
the event, everyone takes something fruity home with them.

Here is what happened, and also here.

Here is a video round-up of the whole Taste of Tubbut event, effectively capturing the VIBE.

For the second part, to be completed in April, here is the list of ingredients:

PASSIONfruit Portable Community Museum

Community
Tubbut Neighbourhood House users and interested residents from the
surrounding area, their friends and invited guests.
Blog/Newsletter readers distributed far & wide via the (f)route network.

Flavours
Conversations, personal stories and mementos, knowledge and skills
transference, mapping, celebration of community, local history and
sharing the fruit harvest.

I am interested in the idea of presenting local and community
history in a nomadic, portable format. The dynamic and ephemeral
pop-up museum format presents a real, viable and sustainable
alternative to the conventional local history display that we now
expect to see in every small town.

Recipe
1: Pop-up Museum at The Taste of Tubbut
An event-based pop-up community museum based around the theme of
fruit (people bring objects, recipes, preserves, jams) where
people create hand-written labels describing why their object is
meaningful, or a story they want to tell about their object.
Likely to be combined with the Taste of Tubbut event to be held on
Saturday 25th February 2012.

2: Blog/Newsletter
The artist uses the objects and labels as content for a
blog/newsletter in homage to The Local Rag & Tubbut Tattler. The
blog/newsletter will also draw on local history interviews
(current and archives) and donated recipes. This will also be made
available as a downloadable printable publication.

3: PASSIONflowers
The artist will make herself available for PASSIONflowers
conversations for a follow-up bloc of time (approx 2 weeks). From
these one-on-one conversations/interviews she will produce maps.
These maps will function as a record and an artwork. These
conversations could then be extended in a workshop to turn the
project material into content for a (f)route CART. This project
wrap-up/celebration/workshop/event would involve several key
people who would work with the artist to speculate about a design
for a Portable Community Museum which would feed into the CART
section of the (f)route project.

SKILLZ
Meanwhile, the Tubbut Neighbourhood House is planning to run
workshops and local history interviews that could also be
documented for use in the blog/newsletter & for the PASSIONfruit
Portable Community Museum. The artist would not need to be present
for these workshops/interviews, but it does need a dedicated
recorder/chronicler, and a sound recording could be produced which
may be used in the CART.

2011 ends

Fri, 30 Dec 2011 09:51:45 +1100

So I have graduated from my BFA in Sculpture! But I continue to be busy. About to head off for a workshop in Bronze and Aluminium Sculpture in Toowoomba, but writing this post at my mother’s house in East Gippsland, where the internet is powered by generator, solar panels and satellite.

My ArtStart Grant application to fund travel to a Conference in Portland, Oregon, visit artist’s collectives in the US and for a new laptop, was unsuccessful, but the (f)route project is going ahead, with a funded artist residency in March/April this year, which will be based in here in East Gippsland.

My application for Inflight WAS successful and the project is scheduled for May, to coincide with the 2012 Open Engagement Conference. So I have been sweating over an application which will involve an artwalk/tour to be held in Hobart at the same time as the conference. The idea is that the event will stimulate an virtual/online engagement and dialogue between geographically separate socially-engaged artists that will create new relationships and community links. Also planning to contribute to Inflight’s January fundraiser and Touchy Feely #1 - a project created by artists Amy Spiers and Pip Stafford, but both will be from a distance, as I’m not heading back to Tasmania until early February.

Meanwhile, I have been procrastinating terribly over a blog post for The Yeoman’s Project, even though Ian Milliss has been incredibly kind and patient with me. A crucial component of the piece is a map of my father’s garden, which I am waiting for him to draft. I’ve extended my deadline several times, sorry Ian.

The image is of our PARK(ing) Day event. The Recyclibrary was hugely successful and is continuing to pop-up around Hobart. Please subscribe to the mailing list, donate your unwanted books or visit the Recyclibrarians as they spread their BOOKLOVE.

I’m still here

Sun, 18 Sep 2011 12:35:04 +1000

To let you know I am still here is the purpose of this blog post. I do still inhabit this bit of cyberspace. However, I have had very limited access to internet access over the last month.

Things I have been doing?

Interviewing my parent’s on their gardening practices, to get into practice for the upcoming
(f)route project. Making work for my final submission for University, to get that BFA. Spontaneously organising PARK(ing) Day events around Hobart, and applying for an ArtStart Grant to fund travel to the Open Engagement Conference in Portland, Oregon, visit artist’s collectives in the US and for a new laptop. And other stuff, including reading up on Relational Aesthetics for my final essay.

Next, I’ll write an application for Inflight, and a blog post for The Yeoman’s Project.

So I’m still here.