Try This at Home

Overview

"What if it's a big hoax and we create a better world for nothing?" a climate-change denier asks at a climate summit in one memorably epigrammatic USA Today cartoon. His ironic declaration seems to capture the buzz around current trends in the sustainability movement, where the community of old is combined with the technology of the new, gelled together with a heavy dose of ingenuity and comes out signposting of a future we'd be happy to live in.

The works on display at Try This at Home might be part of this happy future. The exhibition invites artists and collectives to creatively address the issue of sustainable living. A part of the Curating Cities project, it will branch out of its home at Object's Project Space to mingle with We Make This City in Taylor Square, facilitate discussion on the blog, and otherwise encourage and inspire people to play along at home.

The exhibition includes a very practicable bike-powered home cinema system by Magnificent Revolution Australia, which, if you pedal hard and fast enough, will allow you to watch a documentary on the carbon-neutral CO2penhagen music festival; the very scientific Natural Fuse (2008) from Haque Design + Research, which uses hooked-up plants to offset your personal energy consumption through carbon sequestration; and the very participatory 6 Jars project from the Makeshift Collective, encouraging you to replace processed, packaged goods with homemade alternatives and share them within your neighbourhood group.

The set-up isn't as attractive as it could have been, and it's not quite as cosy as the "living room" they were going for, but the projects on show at Try This at Home will fire up your imagination and leave you with something — be it a jar of date balls or a shiny idea — to take home at the end.