Public Art Melbourne Biennial Lab
What happens now?
17—23 October
PAST EVENT
World Premiere
The Queen Victoria Market, an iconic meeting place for the city, has been explored anew through the lens of leading Australian artists as part of the inaugural Public Art Melbourne Biennial Lab: What Happens Now? curated by Natalie King.
In June this year, a group of artists came together for an intense two-week period, developing concepts in a laboratory environment under the mentorship of international public art experts. The results will be revealed at this year’s Melbourne Festival with commissions that respond to the many layers of meaning embedded in the Market.
From elaborate and evocative installations to ethereal moments of human connection and release, this suite of temporary new works will reinterpret the Market; probing its Indigenous, mercantile, migratory and colonial past, while sharing its secrets and celebrating its stories.
Curatorium: Natalie King (Chief Curator), David Cross (artist, curator, Head of Art and Performance, Deakin University), Jefa Greenaway (architect, Director, Greenaway Architects and Indigenous Architecture and Design Victoria), Veronica Kent (artist, The Telepathy Project), Djon Mundine OAM (curator, activist and writer), Fiona Whitworth (Queen Victoria Market), Lynda Roberts (City of Melbourne).
International Affiliates: Claire Doherty (Director, Situations), Khairuddin Hori (artist and former Deputy Director of Artistic Programming, Palais de Tokyo, Paris), Hou Hanru (Director, MAXXI, Rome).
Further information on artworks and times →
PROJECTS
A CENTRE FOR EVERYTHING, Visible Hands
ISOBEL KNOWLES AND VAN SOWERWINE, Out In The Open
KIRON ROBINSON, Upon this troubled sea
STEVEN RHALL, Gesture (70º East) New Day Rising
THE MECHANICS INSTITUTE, Trade School
PUBLIC ART MELBOURNE BIENNIAL LAB PUBLIC PROGRAM AND FREE WALKING TOURS
Limited spaces, book now →
WALK TWO—SIBLING, ISOBEL KNOWLES AND VAN SOWERWINE
THU 20 OCTOBER 12.30PM
Today’s walk includes two artist talks by SIBLING, whose work Over Obelisk obscures and asks the public to think through the contested John Batman monument, and Isobel Knowles and Van Sowerwine, who’s animation tells the story of a market trader's relationship to the market in Out in the Open.
WALK THREE—KIRON ROBINSON AND STEVEN RHALL
FRI 21 OCTOBER 12.30PM
Today’s walk includes two artist talks by Kiron Robinson, whose work Upon this troubled sea looks at the market’s chaotic fluidity as a place of comfort and contentment, and Steven Rhall, whose work Gesture (70º East) New Day Rising uses the market’s grid formation in examining the demarcation of land and the grid’s influence on our urban environment.
WALK FOUR—HIROMI TANGO AND THE MECHANICS INSTITUTE
SAT 22 OCTOBER 12.30PM
Today’s walk includes two artist talks by Hiromi Tango, whose collaborative, undulating sculptural installation Wrapped extrudes from the built infrastructure on the Peel Street side of the A Shed, and The Mechanics Institute, who will be running a trade school within the Market, looking at various economies in the Queen Victoria Markets.
BIENNIAL LAB & MPavilion:
RETHINKING PUBLIC SPACE
WED 19 OCTOBER 6—7PM FREE
Discover what makes the Biennial Lab so intriguing. Join eminent curators in the public sphere, Khairuddin Hori and Natalie King, and Timothy Moore of SIBLING at MPavilion. Find out more →
FIELD THEORY's '9000 MINUTES'
MON 17—SUN 23 OCTOBER FREE
Field Theory does 9000 minutes, a work based at the Queen Victoria Markets but fed-by-radio live to MPavilion via Field Theory’s custom-designed speaker boxes. Find out more →
IMAGE | Sharon Blance
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