Overview
If one of the joys of crowdfunding is being able to find out about cool ideas from the get-go rather than finish line (and it is), then today's announcement by Underbelly Arts of a matched group Pozible campaign is the equivalent of a basket of kittens at an ice-cream stand. The biennial festival, probably Sydney's leading event for fresh interdisciplinary and interactive art, is better known to audiences as that one big day of playtime on atmospheric Cockatoo Island. But Underbelly Arts doesn't spend two years sleeping; it uses that time to foster the development of new work, which you can now sample.
Eight Underbelly Arts participants have launched Pozible campaigns today, with every dollar they earn through successful campaigns to be matched by the Keir Foundation (up to a value of $2500 per project). "[Crowdfunding] is a natural fit for these eight projects, all of them great ideas with ambitious plans," says artistic director Eliza Sarlos, "The next step is making them happen, and I can't think of a better way to do that than speaking to your audience at each stage of development, and bringing them into the process of art in the making — two ideas already central to what Underbelly Arts is."
It's the first time this funding model will be trialled in Australia, and it's aimed not at replacing the traditional government grants and sponsors but augmenting and feeding them. It's your chance to do a bit of layman's philanthropy before festival day in July, get invested in some of the (rather epic) works and maybe get a (suitably offbeat) reward. We've profiled the eight projects below.
zin's Party Mode
A surprise party for everyone? This young Sydney collective promises to throw the bash of the season — clashing your usual zonked-out party mindset into the political narrative that continues to go on around you. They're putting on a series of politically charged parties this year that will be a whole lot of in your-face/food-for-thought fun. This one prompts you to think about information security...and they're not telling us much else. Plus, if you have a spare $1000, send it their way and you can have your own zin's PARTY MODE at your place.
Cockatoo Island Ghost Story
American Horror Story: Asylum meets art gallery audio guide, this look at Cockatoo Island's sinister past is not one for the faint of heart. Before The Island bar, the island was Biloela Public School and Reformatory for Girls, which rose from the ruins of prison to infamy during the tail end of the 1800s. Home to orphans and young girls unfortunate enough to be deemed delinquent, it was described as "simply a hell upon Earth; the abominations and acts of cruelty there practised being for the most part utterly unfit for publication" (until now) by the Brisbane Courier Mail in 1874. This is a smart phone only affair (sorry old-schoolers) based on a geolocative mobile phone app that will guide you through Cockatoo's dark side. Additionally, 19th-century institutional practises are a wonderful antidote to Austen-itis and other cases of severe nostalgia.
Stations of the Southern Cross
Applespiel will return to Underbelly Arts with a look at all things Australian: past, present and future. Five stations (that is right, one for each of the stars on your favourite festival tattoo) spread across the island will culminate in a journey through time, space, mediums and, judging by their intro video, wordplay. This all sounds great, but the "mentoring from Steve Le Marquand on how to be really Australian" as mentioned on their pledge page has feature-length-movie potential. Yes, he is that guy from Two Hands who has swagger in rugby short and waxes lyrical about sawn-off shotguns (if "yeah shotties are good mate" is Aussie for wax lyrical). Chip in just $25 for this Stations of the Southern Cross, and Applespiel will name a thing of your choice (pet, child, theory, etc).
Project HOME
Brothers Abdul Abdullah and Abdul-Rahman Abdullah are coming over from Western Australia to reimagine their family home on Cockatoo Island. It will be the premier collaboration of two artistic brothers, a sculptor and an Archibald-nominated painter, as they go autobiographical to give us the Abdullah childhood experience. The duo have identified nine as an age of awakening: as a person, and as person who has to negotiate a broader national context to build their identity — and it's also the age difference between them. The brothers will be building house with personal and found objects to explore these ideas.
I met you on a city that isn't on the map
What would you do if you had three minutes to live? Cry? Us too. But We Do Not Unhappen is giving us all the chance to experience those last moments before the nuclear/zombie/solar-flare/global warming apocalypse with a lived-experience game across Cockatoo Island that will encourage strangers to collaborate. They will use their raised funds to research, plan and build a 'hub', fit for touring, to create (and then spread) the experience of impending doom. To reward you for your contribution, they'll make you into a mannequin or a video installation, or, if you're really generous, abduct you and a friend off the street for funsies.
Tableau Vivant
Co-artistic directors of Art Month 2013, Penelope Benton and Alex Clapham, are looking backward and forwards with their living picture installation. Drawing on the popular French art form of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, this pair will explore ideas of spectacle, pop culture and food with a whole lot of colour, flair and feasting — all around the dinner table.
Nothing to See Here
In terms of visual identity/signifiers Sydney Harbour Bridge is a big one. Our harbour city is undoubtedly a harbour-bridge city, but artists Amy Spiers and Catherine Ryan are giving us a chance to see the harbour ditch the coat hanger and go nude. The pair will erect a viewing platform and then, somehow, blank out the bridge from view. An ode to the controversial suggestion of artist Horst Hoheisel to destroy the Brandenburg Gate as a memorial to the Jews murdered during the Holocaust, this project aims to highlight the invisible histories of modern Australia, such as those of Indigenous peoples and asylum seekers. Any money raised in excess of the target will go towards commissioning essays by Australian writers to accompany the project.
In Deep Water
Kate Sfetkidis, live performer and lighting designer, is bringing the bottom of the ocean, and all our childhood dreams of marine biology, to the surface at Cockatoo Island. Submerging a series of built jellyfish (and other deep sea critters) lights in darkness with an accompanying soundscape, she will give us a chance to see the light from some of our planet’s darkest corners. Plus if you check out the project blog, you can see a Vampire Squid — a pre-historic relic that can turn itself inside out when startled — which is the critter our fingers will be crossed for come opening day.
By Ruby Lennon and Rima Sabina Aouf